An Inconvenient Truth

[Warhammer]

Originally Posted by MrBigglesworth

Your point was that the mean was arbitrarily chosen and that it may have been that we are just now coming out of an ice age. The graph shows that these have been the warmest temperatures in 450,000 years.

Well, we are coming out of an ice age (we're in an interglacial period, either we're going in or coming out of one), plus 450,000 years is nothing on a 4.5 billion year planet.

Originally Posted by MrBigglesworth

I don't know now you could conclude that, as it looks fairly stable after coming out of the last ice age, and also considering the graph posted earlier showing stable conditions right as the industrial age started.

No, check the scales. Prior to the change in scale at the 1870 line, that graph is in thousands of years. Yet, the slope of that line is steeply up. That goes back about 15,000 years or so by my guess on the scale. I don't see how you can't see that.

Originally Posted by MrBigglesworth

No, that's not what I am saying. I am saying you have a case where the great preponderance of evidence is on one side, and even though you can pick apart each little detail, when taken as a whole it creates a stark picture. In terrorism terms, consider the global warming scientists to be an informant that tells you that the terrorists are plotting a nuclear attack. This terrorist has been right before, but this time he COULD be lying. He gave you a sample of uranium as proof, but he COULD have just found it on the street. If his story were true, there would be a radioactive signature near the building he says the terrorists are in, and you check and there is that signature, but it COULD be some nuclear waste that someone left there. You could pick apart each individual facet of the case. What would you do in that situation though? Not do anything, or take some reasonable steps to stop what is likely to be happening?

My point is that there is enough holes in the "evidence" to go either way. If Mann's work is so great, why doesn't he go back and fill in the holes? Plus, from what I gather, there is too much collaboration between Mann and the other researchers conducting "independent" (hard to be independent when Mann is a big source) studies to backup Mann. That is akin to me proving that 1+1 = 3, then having a buddy of mine back it up, using my data.

Heck, by your example above, does this terrorist have an axe to grind? Is he trying to take down someone he doesn't like to gain power for himself? Now, you need to find another source to backup the first one. Heck, if you don't get more independent sources, next thing you know you invade Iraq looking for WMDs that aren't there.

My point is, to take your example further, you get another person to investigate, who finds that instead of uranium, its radon that is being detected by the building. Now, the initial source shouts down the dissenting voice saying that we have to act now, or the terrorist MAY strike in the near future. We have to act now, we can't afford to conduct further research.

The problem is in this case, he might be right, we might have a city blow up tomorrow. Damn, we should have acted. On the flip side, we take our time, he leaves the premises and he blows up a town. Damn, we should have acted (for the record, I'll call this the Iraq scenario). Or, we go in immediately, shoot to kill, and find out that it was nothing, it was a hoax. Damn, we spent a lot of resources for nothing. Or, we get additional data, find out it is a hoax. Great, thank God, we didn't go in and shoot an innocent man. Or, we get additional data, find out that it is uranium, go in and take down a bad guy.

My whole thing with global warming is that our frame of reference is far too small. 450,000 years is 1/1,000,000 of the earth's life time. Or to represent it another way, .000001 of the total lifetime of the earth. That 450,000 years is .0009 of the time that at least Cambrian life has been on earth. That is nothing, and to think it is some earth shattering event needs more review. Heck, if things are as dire as people point out, taking another 10 years to figure this out, isn't going to kill us, because we're already too far gone.

Not only that, but you have another researcher from Switzerland saying that it has been our improved pollution controls that have led to the increased temperatures, you're damned if you do, and damned if you don't. For the record, his study shows that with less particulate pollution in the atmosphere, you have less cloud formation and less of an albierto (sp.?) effect. Which makes sense, because with less cloud cover, you have less sunlight reflected by the clouds and more absorbed by dark matter on the ground.

So, even if we commit to Kyoto, we are not committing ourselves to less of an impact on the environment. If this Swiss guy is right, we might be damning ourselves even more. The problem is, we don't know enough to be sure.

Still, after reading the counter side of the issue, asking Mann to reproduce his work, explain his methodology, explain why only one sample of bristlepine cone trees was represented far more than any other data sample (also the one source of data that provides the "hockey stick" doomsday scenario of temperatures), explain why he didn't use proper procedures in manipulating PCs as data, why he used extrapolated data as hard sources (heck, even this alone strikes me, basing most of your data, 400 years worth, on tree cores doesn't seem like a great idea to me), etc. You can get me on board. But Mann's stance of just shouting down, and not really addressing the specific issues is not science. Picking apart a methodology is part of science. If you have good data, but manipulate it incorrectly (think of the Andromeda Galaxy scare of the 1930s and blueshifting) and you do more harm then good. It is only by critical review that errors in postulates can be seen and accounted for. Without that critical review, you aren't following the scientific method.

Any engineering, physics, or chemistry student understands that conducting experiments is only part of the process. The experiment must be dissected in small detail, and all potential sources of error must be documented. If you do not account for all errors, you really do not have a good data set. That is one of the reasons why experimental error is so important. If you are measuring the pH of something and you measure it at 6, it needs to be below 6.5, but your margin of error on your equipment is 1.0, you have some decisions to make.

This is where I have problems with everything. We're trying to shortcut the whole process by claiming we've got to act now, or we're screwed. I just don't buy it. If someone wants to go out and buy a hybrid car so they do something for the environment, I'm fine with that. But don't cram this stuff down my throat and point to the science without following proper scientific procedure.

[dawgfan]

Good stuff Warhammer. As a commited proponent of the scientific process, I encourage informed skepticism of the contention that human-related activities are contributing to/causing global warming. That's the whole point of science - observe, hypothesize, test, theorize, and share your conclusions for the rest of the world so they can test your results. Let the best theory win (i.e. the one that best models/predicts/defines the real world).

This issue is big enough that I feel the need to spend more effort researching the science that is out there, to get a better grasp of what is being stated by all sides, their methodologies, and what connections they all have (funding being the primary source of my interest).

Unlike other skeptics in this thread, you are relying on real scientific objections to the majority opinion that human activities are contributing to/causing the current global warming. You aren't questioning the idea that the earth is in a warming period, nor do you seem to question that global warming could have immense consequences on human civilization.

Your articulate arguments are contributing to my desire to do more research on the topic, so for any out there that throw out blanket statements like "political thread arguments are useless because nobody ever changes their minds after reading them or participating in them", your contention is false. Informed debate is always a good thing - if your ideas and opinions are worth anything, they stand up to challenge.

[MrBigglesworth]

Science in action:

The scientific consensus is clearly expressed in the reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Created in 1988 by the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environmental Programme, IPCC's purpose is to evaluate the state of climate science as a basis for informed policy action, primarily on the basis of peer-reviewed and published scientific literature (3). In its most recent assessment, IPCC states unequivocally that the consensus of scientific opinion is that Earth's climate is being affected by human activities: "Human activities ... are modifying the concentration of atmospheric constituents ... that absorb or scatter radiant energy. ... [M]ost of the observed warming over the last 50 years is likely to have been due to the increase in greenhouse gas concentrations" [p. 21 in (4)].

IPCC is not alone in its conclusions. In recent years, all major scientific bodies in the United States whose members' expertise bears directly on the matter have issued similar statements. For example, the National Academy of Sciences report, Climate Change Science: An Analysis of Some Key Questions, begins: "Greenhouse gases are accumulating in Earth's atmosphere as a result of human activities, causing surface air temperatures and subsurface ocean temperatures to rise" [p. 1 in (5)]. The report explicitly asks whether the IPCC assessment is a fair summary of professional scientific thinking, and answers yes: "The IPCC's conclusion that most of the observed warming of the last 50 years is likely to have been due to the increase in greenhouse gas concentrations accurately reflects the current thinking of the scientific community on this issue" [p. 3 in (5)].

Others agree. The American Meteorological Society (6), the American Geophysical Union (7), and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) all have issued statements in recent years concluding that the evidence for human modification of climate is compelling (8).

The drafting of such reports and statements involves many opportunities for comment, criticism, and revision, and it is not likely that they would diverge greatly from the opinions of the societies' members. Nevertheless, they might downplay legitimate dissenting opinions. That hypothesis was tested by analyzing 928 abstracts, published in refereed scientific journals between 1993 and 2003, and listed in the ISI database with the keywords "climate change" (9).

The 928 papers were divided into six categories: explicit endorsement of the consensus position, evaluation of impacts, mitigation proposals, methods, paleoclimate analysis, and rejection of the consensus position. Of all the papers, 75% fell into the first three categories, either explicitly or implicitly accepting the consensus view; 25% dealt with methods or paleoclimate, taking no position on current anthropogenic climate change. Remarkably, none of the papers disagreed with the consensus position.

Admittedly, authors evaluating impacts, developing methods, or studying paleoclimatic change might believe that current climate change is natural. However, none of these papers argued that point.

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/conten.../306/5702/1686

[Raiders Army]

The Butterfly Effect x100

[GMO]

Originally Posted by dawgfan

You'll excuse me if I find this retort from the Competitive Enterprise Institute (Wikipedia entry) to not be an impartial source of information. Check the list of corporations funding them.

I also love how in this retort, they imply that CO2 emission are a good thing:


Right - keep up those CO2 emissions, otherwise we'll tumble into an ice age.

It doesn't matter who is funding it, the point is if their rebuttal is correct or not. It's better to talk about the science and not try to attack them personally.

Everyone is being paid. Al Gore is being paid and is gaining a lot of publicity too. Perhaps his sincerity should be questioned also.

[GMO]

Originally Posted by MrBigglesworth

Science in action:

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/conten.../306/5702/1686

Here's another point of view:

http://www.friendsofscience.org/index.php?ide=7

[GMO]

Originally Posted by GMO

Here's another point of view:

http://www.friendsofscience.org/index.php?ide=7

Here's a quote from the website:


In 2006, Friends of Science commissioned Dr Madhav Khandekar, a retired Environment Canada Research Scientist and co-author of the 64 page "Independent SPM" (download here) to compile for everyone's use a bibliography of peer-reviewed climate science papers, critical of the IPCC's politicised version of the science. This was necessary because of the widely distributed essay in Science by Dr Naomi Oreskes who had conducted a survey with limited key-words, which erroneously concluded that no such papers existed. In our ongoing attempt to educate the public, media and politicians as to the true extent of climate science research, we are offering Madhav's work to the world-wide Climate-Sceptics community. Like the video on our website, we are not claiming copyright. On the contrary, we urge you to copy and distribute this bibliography wherever you can.

The bibliography is presented in two formats: for a straight listing of papers by subject category, with a very brief annotation only, click here. For the totality of Madhav's original work, click here. We hope this will be useful to you. Your comments and additions will be valued.

[MrBigglesworth]

Originally Posted by GMO

Here's another point of view:

http://www.friendsofscience.org/index.php?ide=7

I can compile a list of several links that have scientists arguing that the world is a couple thousand years old. The study I mentioned looked at peer reviewed studies (and was itself peer reviewed). Among the links that friends of science give that look like actual scholarly research:

This one says that man is responsible for climate change:

http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/98/26/14778

As does this one:

http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/97/18/9875

And that is pretty much everything in the list that looks like it was published in a peer-reviewed journal.

[ThunderingHERD]

To be fair, they also cite an article from the very prestigious journal Science. Of course, it concludes:

Trends in human-influenced environmental changes are now evident in hurricane regions. These changes are expected to affect hurricane intensity and rainfall, but the effect on hurricane numbers remains unclear. The key scientific question is not whether there is a trend in hurricane numbers and tracks, but rather how hurricanes are changing.

But, hey, at least they know their audience--well enough to know that they aren't particularly concerned with actually investigating claims which they believe to be true.

[dawgfan]

Originally Posted by GMO

It doesn't matter who is funding it, the point is if their rebuttal is correct or not. It's better to talk about the science and not try to attack them personally.

Do you know enough about climatology to personally question these findings? Neither do I. But the fact that a large majority of climatologists disagree with these people, coupled with the fact the reports are sponsored by a group that is primarily funded by corporations that stand to lose a great deal financially from said claims leads me to be quite skeptical of these particular reports.

Everyone is being paid. Al Gore is being paid and is gaining a lot of publicity too. Perhaps his sincerity should be questioned also.

That's an interesting claim - exactly who is paying Al Gore to speak up about the belief that human activity is causing global warming?

There's an obvious tremendous financial incentive for the oil industry to dispute the idea that global warming can be attributed to human activity, especially side effects from burning gasoline. What obvious tremendous financial benefits would there be for someone to promote the idea of human-caused global warming?

[GMO]

Originally Posted by dawgfan

Do you know enough about climatology to personally question these findings? Neither do I. But the fact that a large majority of climatologists disagree with these people, coupled with the fact the reports are sponsored by a group that is primarily funded by corporations that stand to lose a great deal financially from said claims leads me to be quite skeptical of these particular reports.


That's an interesting claim - exactly who is paying Al Gore to speak up about the belief that human activity is causing global warming?

There's an obvious tremendous financial incentive for the oil industry to dispute the idea that global warming can be attributed to human activity, especially side effects from burning gasoline. What obvious tremendous financial benefits would there be for someone to promote the idea of human-caused global warming?

Al Gore's movie is making a lot of money.
Al Gore is being paid for his speeches and many other events.
Al Gore is getting a lot of publicity for himself which will help him a lot to get elected for govt positions.
Al Gore has a lot of pay for what he's doing.

For many other groups it's a means of control, They want to create a feeling of panic so we'll do what they want.

[GMO]

Originally Posted by dawgfan

Do you know enough about climatology to personally question these findings? Neither do I. But the fact that a large majority of climatologists disagree with these people, coupled with the fact the reports are sponsored by a group that is primarily funded by corporations that stand to lose a great deal financially from said claims leads me to be quite skeptical of these particular reports.


?

A large number of climatologists agree with them. The problem is that those who doubt that humans are a significant contributor to climate change don't get reported in the media.

Those who say that climate is being significantly affected by human activity are also are being paid by someone, so they have an interest in putting forward their viewpoint. Why is it that there is skepticism for one side of the discussion but not for the other?

These groups who say that human activity has a significant influence on climate get a lot of money from donations so it's in their interest to create panic so they'll get a lot of donations.
Other groups have other influences.
Everyone is paid somehow. We all need money for food, shelter etc. So no group can be called 'pure'.

As I said above why is it that only those who say that human activity has not been shown to have a significant factor in climate change has their motives questioned?

We all have rely on experts but there should be fairness on both sides.

As for me, I'm no expert in climatology but I have taken a few university courses in meteorolgy and climatology but I changed to another major and never did graduate in it.
But from the bit that I do know, it's far from being proven that human activity is a significant factor in climate change. Climate is almost always changing going back to the beginning of this planet.

[GMO]

Originally Posted by MrBigglesworth

I can compile a list of several links that have scientists arguing that the world is a couple thousand years old. The study I mentioned looked at peer reviewed studies (and was itself peer reviewed). Among the links that friends of science give that look like actual scholarly research:

This one says that man is responsible for climate change:

http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/98/26/14778

As does this one:

http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/97/18/9875

And that is pretty much everything in the list that looks like it was published in a peer-reviewed journal.

I don't know where you looked but the website that I gave above has a long list of peer-reviewed scientific articles that doubt that humans are a significant factor in climate change.

[ThunderingHERD]

Originally Posted by GMO

I don't know where you looked but the website that I gave above has a long list of peer-reviewed scientific articles that doubt that humans are a significant factor in climate change.

The articles that he mentioned, as well as the one I mentioned, are from that list. Though the website suggests that the list is of peer-reviewed articles, that simply isn't true for the majority of the pieces linked. For example: the first link is a partial transcript of a speech, three of the links are to articles published by the Fraser Institute, one is from a personal website, one is from an opinion piece in the WSJ, one is from Atlantic Monthly, etc.

There are a few that come from legitimate peer-reviewed journals, but the ones which support their position come from very bad ones. Bulletin of Canadian Petroleum Geology, for example, which, according to ISI impact factor, ranks as the 39th most influential journal in the narrow field of "Energy and fuels" and 112th (out of 129) among multidisciplinary geoscience journals.

As mentioned previously, they do link to articles from Science, which is easily the most influential multidisciplinary scientific journal, and PNAS, which isn't far behind. However, the articles from those journals do not support the website's position.

Furthermore, the vast majority of the articles which they link to deal specifically with global warming and its influence on hurricanes, not with the larger issue of global warming itself.

Edit:

They do also link to an article from the Bulletin of the AMS. The authors reach the conclusion that "linkages between global warming and hurricane impacts are premature," however, they also state that "In the future, such a connection may be established [e.g., in the case of the observations of Emanuel (2005) or the projections of Knutson and Tuleya (2004)] or made in the context of other metrics of tropical cyclone intensity and duration that remain to be closely examined." Ultimately, they find that "there are ... much, much better ways to justify climate mitigation policies than with hurricanes (e.g., Rayner 2004)," clearly indicating that their beef is not with the necessity of environmental policies, but rather with using hurricanes to justifty them.

[MrBigglesworth]

Originally Posted by ThunderingHERD

The articles that he mentioned, as well as the one I mentioned, are from that list. Though the website suggests that the list is of peer-reviewed articles, that simply isn't true for the majority of the pieces linked. For example: the first link is a partial transcript of a speech, three of the links are to articles published by the Fraser Institute, one is from a personal website, one is from an opinion piece in the WSJ, one is from Atlantic Monthly, etc.

There are a few that come from legitimate peer-reviewed journals, but the ones which support their position come from very bad ones. Bulletin of Canadian Petroleum Geology, for example, which, according to ISI impact factor, ranks as the 39th most influential journal in the narrow field of "Energy and fuels" and 112th (out of 129) among multidisciplinary geoscience journals.

As mentioned previously, they do link to articles from Science, which is easily the most influential multidisciplinary scientific journal, and PNAS, which isn't far behind. However, the articles from those journals do not support the website's position.

Furthermore, the vast majority of the articles which they link to deal specifically with global warming and its influence on hurricanes, not with the larger issue of global warming itself.

Word. I got them from the website that you posted as an 'alternative view'.

Originally Posted by ThunderingHERD

Edit:

They do also link to an article from the Bulletin of the AMS. The authors reach the conclusion that "linkages between global warming and hurricane impacts are premature," however, they also state that "In the future, such a connection may be established [e.g., in the case of the observations of Emanuel (2005) or the projections of Knutson and Tuleya (2004)] or made in the context of other metrics of tropical cyclone intensity and duration that remain to be closely examined." Ultimately, they find that "there are ... much, much better ways to justify climate mitigation policies than with hurricanes (e.g., Rayner 2004)," clearly indicating that their beef is not with the necessity of environmental policies, but rather with using hurricanes to justifty them.

I actually didn't look at any of the hurricane ones, because I think that there is a lot of debate about whether or not global warming means harsher hurricanes. The thing that we are interested in is whether or not man has some impact on the climate. All of the peer-reviewed articles at the website that GMO gave support the view that man is at least partly responsible.

[clintl]

Originally Posted by GMO

A large number of climatologists agree with them. The problem is that those who doubt that humans are a significant contributor to climate change don't get reported in the media.

That is a bunch of crap. If anything, the opinions of skeptic climatologists have been overrepresented in the mainstream media if compared to the actual numbers of them that exist.

[dawgfan]

Originally Posted by GMO

Al Gore's movie is making a lot of money.
Al Gore is being paid for his speeches and many other events.
Al Gore is getting a lot of publicity for himself which will help him a lot to get elected for govt positions.
Al Gore has a lot of pay for what he's doing.

Uh-huh. Whatever fees Gore receives from his appearances and presentations pales by orders of magnitude in comparison to the financial incentive for the petroleum industry and related industries to fight the contention of human-driven global warming. Not to mention he's donating 100% of his share of the profits from the book and movie.

And that still doesn't explain a financial incentive for the scientists whose work he bases his presentation on. There's a contention that these scientists are biasing their results in order to obtain grants and funding, but I've yet to see a logical explanation for why the government (a major source of grants and research funding) would have an interest in steering research to a conclusion of human-driven global warming.

For many other groups it's a means of control, They want to create a feeling of panic so we'll do what they want.

Ah, I see - those that are trying to get the public's attention about humans and their role in global warming are doing so for the thrill of "control". Yeah, that makes sense.

[dawgfan]

Originally Posted by MrBigglesworth

I actually didn't look at any of the hurricane ones, because I think that there is a lot of debate about whether or not global warming means harsher hurricanes. The thing that we are interested in is whether or not man has some impact on the climate. All of the peer-reviewed articles at the website that GMO gave support the view that man is at least partly responsible.

I thought the debate was whether global warming leads to an increase in hurricanes, with many saying no. It's my understanding that it is fairly well accepted that global warming leads to hurricanes being more intense, since hurricanes draw strength from the warmth of the water over which they pass.