Poisoning the well

As Mosher and Fuller noted in The CRUTape Letters, in the first years of the twenty-first century relations between Phil Jones and Steve McIntyre were relatively collegial. However, something changed during 2003 and thereafter Jones adopted an approach of blocking all McIntyre's requests for data.

It's hard to tell exactly what prompted this change of heart - the two major events of 2003 were the Soon and Baliunas affair and publication of MM03. Since both of these were critiques directed at Mann, it's not obvious why they would affect Jones. Clearly Jones had to be persuaded that there was a group interest in resisting McIntyre's efforts and in email #1566 we get a taste of how this was achieved. In it, Mann tells other members of the Hockey team about an email he has just sent to McIntyre, telling him that he will not respond to further requests for information (see The Hockey Stick Illusion p.91).

FYI--thought you guys should have this (below). This guy "McIntyre" appears to be yet      another shill for industry--he appears to be the one who forwarded the  the scurrilous      "climateskeptic" criticisms of the recent Bradley et al Science paper. Here is an email I sent him a few weeks ago in response to an inquiry. It appears, by the way, that he has been trying to break into our machine ("multiproxy"). Obviously, this character is looking for any little thing he can get ahold of...

The best that can be done is to ignore their desperate emails and, if they manage to slip something into the peer-reviewed literature, as in the case of Soon & Baliunas, deal w/ it as we did in that case--i.e., the Eos response to Soon et al---they were stung badly by that, and the bad press that followed.For those of you who haven't seen it, I'm forwarding an interesting email exchange from John Holdren of Harvard that  I got the other day. He summarized the whole thing very nicely, form an independent perspective...

Cheers,

mike

p.s. I'm setting up my email server so that it automatically rejects emails from the "usual suspects".  You might want to do the same. As they increasingly get automatic reject messages from the scientists, they'll start to get the picture...

Comments

[M Ryutin]

BBD: ‘consensus’, ‘expert’ and ‘non-expert’ seem to fly around in all these types of arguments, but what are we, the interested ‘non-experts’ to make of what has become known of the expert climate scientists and their consensus to which we all must defer?
Even before Climategate1 we saw strange signals about this group and their scientific method and I wonder what you think of them? I particularly refer as a signal to the excellently-described ‘Casper and the Jesus Paper’ incident ( http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2008/8/11/caspar-and-the-jesus-paper.html - or read the original Steve McIntyre report: http://climateaudit.org/2008/08/06/well-well-look-what-the-cat-dragged-in/) and the description of the methods of the Mann/Jones ‘team’.
In the light of both Climategate exposures, the peer review tweaking – even direct examples of debating how to select admitted tame reviewers when asked to choose ‘independents’ – let alone the talk about how to put pressure/boycott/threaten those who escaped that ‘consensus’, there is a whole host of examples of what is, to me, suspect behaviour on behalf of those to whom we are supposed to grant a pass as ‘experts’.
If this IS the way science works today, this bitching, rivalry, even sabotage, why shouldn’t the ‘non-expert’ be wary. In addition, when supreme world ‘experts’ such as Michael Mann and others talk about ‘shills for industry’ or even email that investigators should be encouraged to work on a Steve McIntyre to discover his (obvious?, taken as a given?) industry backing, should not the monetary rewards for the ‘experts’ be on the table? After all, at least one theorist has said that one must ‘make the enemy live up to their own book of rules’ and money, too, is an issue worth factoring in here, wouldn’t you think?

[johanna]

There are many things wrong with Gutting's article, and PPs have already pointed some of them out.

The one that leapt out at me was his use, without definition, of the term 'climate scientist'. Pretty sloppy for a philosopher.

"Climate science" is a catch all term for a range of disciplines - in fact, any discipline outside the soft sciences arguably has a contribution to make. A lot of the shonky material that has proliferated with the CAGW scare is tainted by researchers going outside their area of expertise - apparently if you call yourself a climate scientist then you can hop between physics, statistics and biology at will to cobble your theories together (if you are Michael Mann), to pick an obvious example.

So, when statisticians analyse the work and find it wanting, they can be dismissed because they are not 'climate scientists'. When biologists raise questions about assumptions made concerning tree rings, ditto.

If Gutting were a halfway decent philosopher, he might have applied his skills to analysing the term 'climate scientist'. That could be an article well worth reading. Instead, he dashed off a piece which not only is just a vehicle for his prejudices, it demonstrates his utter ignorance of the philosophy of science.

[BBD]

Markus

Following Shaviv 2005 above makes clear that inclusion of a new, previously overlooked contributor reduces sensitivity.

You haven't got a clue, have you?

[James P]

BBD

I was thinking of this (the graph titled "Global Temperature and Atmospheric CO2 over Geologic Time"):

Link

How wrong is it?

[LC]

“You haven't got a clue, have you?”

BBD, why do you do this? Markus has made his points in a cogent, polite way and has even listed all his references - something you often castigate others for not doing. He hasn’t abused you. He hasn’t been rude to you. He has merely given you his answers and explained his views. So why do you feel the need to start throwing out insults? If you disagree with him (sorry if I have your gender wrong, Markus), why not just a “Sorry but I think you are wrong” or even an “I’m afraid I disagree completely”? We are all, hopefully, grown-ups here. Surely we can put our individual views across without it getting all bitter and twisted and degenerating into personal insult, can’t we? Otherwise, the result is that people clam up and either refrain from commenting for fear of the reaction, or simply move on elsewhere. The pity is, you are intelligent enough and knowledgeable enough not to need to do it.

[Shub]

LC,
The obvious answer is that, the contrast BBD feels between his own position viis a vis his previous stance is so strong, that he has to insult every passerby who holds any position resembling his former self.

[Skiphil]

@LC

Nice post, but what makes you imagine that "BBD" is not consciously seeking to do exactly what you describe, to insult and mock and disparage so that people may tend to go away and/or tire of the low quality of the "dialogue"?? I agree with what you say except that I do not find reason at all to ascribe any high motives to BBD:

"Surely we can put our individual views across without it getting all bitter and twisted and degenerating into personal insult, can’t we? Otherwise, the result is that people clam up and either refrain from commenting for fear of the reaction, or simply move on elsewhere. The pity is, you are intelligent enough and knowledgeable enough not to need to do it."

[Bishop Hill]

BBD

This is a cease and desist notice to you. I will not have you speaking to other commenters like this. You have been warned before. You will not be warned again.

[BBD]

References?

Co2'Science'? WUWT? Shaviv's work?

Fine BH. Ban me then.

[Mike Jackson]

BBD
References?
desmogblog? sourcewatch? Greenpeace? exxonsecrets?
ROFL

[BBD]

Markus, Mike Jackson, BH

Now I've calmed down a bit...

This is what I had in mind when responding - bluntly, I admit - to Markus above:

Hansen & Sato (2011) Paleoclimate Implications for Human-Made Climate Change and references therein, eg:

In contrast, atmospheric CO2 during the Cenozoic changed from about 1000 ppm in the early Cenozoic (Beerling and Royer, 2011) to as small as 170 ppm during recent ice ages (Luthi et al., 2008). The resulting climate forcing, which can be computed accurately for this CO2 range using formulae in Table 1 of Hansen et al. (2000), exceeds 10 W/m2. CO2 was clearly the dominant climate forcing in the Cenozoic.

Global temperature change in the first half of the Cenozoic is consistent with expected effects of plate tectonics (continental drift) on atmospheric CO2. Subduction of ocean crust by an overriding tectonic plate causes crustal melt and metamorphism of the subducted plate and sediments, with release of volatiles including CO2. Carbon amount in surface reservoirs depends on the balance between this outgassing (via volcanoes and seltzer springs) from Earth's crust and burial in the crust, including change in the amount of buried organic matter (Berner, 2004). CO2 outgassing occurs during subduction of oceanic crust and weathering (oxidation) of previously buried organic matter. Burial is via chemical weathering of rocks with deposition of carbonates on the ocean floor and burial of organic matter, some of which eventually may form fossil fuels.

Rates of outgassing and burial of CO2 are each typically 1012-1013 mol C/year (Staudigel et al., 1989; Edmond and Huh, 2003; Berner, 2004). Imbalance between outgassing and burial is limited by negative feedbacks in the geochemical carbon cycle (Berner and Caldeira, 1997), but a net natural imbalance of the order of 1012 mol C/year can be maintained on long time scales, as continental drift affects the rate of outgassing. Such an imbalance, after distribution among surface reservoirs, is only ~0.0001 ppm/year of atmospheric CO2. That rate is negligible compared to the present human-made atmospheric CO2 increase of ~2 ppm/year, yet in a million years such a consistent crustal imbalance can alter atmospheric CO2 by ~100 ppm.

India was the only land area located far from its current location at the beginning of the Cenozoic. The Indian plate was still south of the Equator, but moving northward at a rate of about 20 cm per year (Kumar et al., 2007), a rapid continental drift rate. The Indian plate moved through the Tethys Ocean, now the Indian Ocean, which had long been the depocenter for carbonate and organic sediments from major world rivers.

The strong global warming trend between 60 and 50 My ago was presumably a consequence of increasing atmospheric CO2, as the Indian plate subducted carbonate-rich ocean crust while traversing the Tethys Ocean (Kent and Muttoni, 2008). The magnitude of the CO2 source continued to increase until India crashed into Asia and began pushing up the Himalaya Mountains and Tibetan Plateau. Emissions from this tectonic source continue even today, but the magnitude of emissions began decreasing after the Indo-Asian collision and as a consequence the planet cooled. The climate variations between 30 and 15 million years ago, when the size of the Antarctic ice sheet fluctuated, may have been due to temporal variations of plate tectonics and outgassing rates (Patriat et al., 2008). Although many mechanisms probably contributed to climate change through the Cenozoic Era, it is clear that CO2 change was the dominant cause of the early warming and the subsequent long-term cooling trend.

Plate tectonics today is producing relatively little subduction of carbonate-rich ocean crust (Edmund and Huh, 2003; Gerlach, 2011), consistent with low Pleistocene levels of CO2 (170-300 ppm) and the cool state of the planet, with ice sheets in the polar regions of both hemispheres. Whether Earth would have cooled further in the absence of humans.

The question I have about Shaviv and Svensmark is simple: why isn't it warmer than it is? What's happening to the radiative forcing from CO2? It should be operating in addition to the increase in DSW from reduced cloud cover.

I've already made the point that arguing for a low climate sensitivity and a highly variable climate (eg MWP) is contradictory. Citing a single, controversial study by Shaviv is not enough.

I've also objected to Markus' claim that the AR5 draft 'lies about climate models and their disability to reconcile ground and troposheric temperature trends'. I did not find his response (point 5 at Dec 31, 2011 at 10:13 PM) convincing, hinging as it does on McIntyre and McKitrick's dispute with Santer et al. (2008). The issues about the reliability of the available observational data make this a weak foundation for a strong claim. Like a flat-out, wide-ranging accusation of dishonesty for example.

I'm trying to show that Markus' position is not coherent or persuasive. And I surmised (bluntly) that this was because he has not had time to research his assumptions, let alone being to question them.

On climate sensitivity see also Annan & Hargreaves (2006); Knutti & Hegerl (2008); IPCC AR4 WG1 Ch. 10 and references therein.

From AR4 WG1:

Since the TAR, the levels of scientific understanding and confidence in quantitative estimates of equilibrium climate sensitivity have increased substantially. Basing our assessment on a combination of several independent lines of evidence, as summarised in Box 10.2 Figures 1 and 2, including observed climate change and the strength of known feedbacks simulated in GCMs, we conclude that the global mean equilibrium warming for doubling CO2, or ‘equilibrium climate sensitivity’, is likely to lie in the range 2°C to 4.5°C, with a most likely value of about 3°C. Equilibrium climate sensitivity is very likely larger than 1.5°C.

----

Annan & Hargreaves (2006)
Annan, J. D., and J. C. Hargreaves (2006), Using multiple observationally-based constraints to estimate climate sensitivity, Geophys. Res. Lett., 33, L06704, doi:10.1029/2005GL025259.

http://www.jamstec.go.jp/frcgc/research/d5/jdannan/GRL_sensitivity.pdf

Hansen & Sato (2011) Paleoclimate implications for Human-Made Climate Change:

http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1105/1105.0968.pdf

IPCC AR4 WG1 Ch. 10 Climate sensitivity boxout:

http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/ch10s10-5.html#box-10-2

Knutti & Hegerl (2008):
Reto Knutti and Gabriele C. Hegerl (2008), The equilibrium sensitivity of the Earth’s temperature to radiation changes, Nature Geoscience, doi:10.1038/ngeo337

http://www.iac.ethz.ch/people/knuttir/papers/knutti08natgeo.pdf

-----

For an informed commentary on Schmittner et al. (2011) see:

Planet 3.0 interview with Nathan Urban:

http://newscience.planet3.org/2011/11/24/interview-with-nathan-urban-on-his-new-paper-climate-sensitivity-estimated-from-temperature-reconstructions-of-the-last-glacial-maximum/

Realclimate:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/11/ice-age-constraints-on-climate-sensitivity

And comments, eg:

-Chris Colose on Hansen's methodology and on Schmittner et al.'s approach:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/11/ice-age-constraints-on-climate-sensitivity/comment-page-1/#comment-220622

- Ray Pierrehumbert:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/11/ice-age-constraints-on-climate-sensitivity/comment-page-1/#comment-220643

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/11/ice-age-constraints-on-climate-sensitivity/comment-page-1/#comment-220654

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/11/ice-age-constraints-on-climate-sensitivity/comment-page-1/#comment-220664

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/11/ice-age-constraints-on-climate-sensitivity/comment-page-1/#comment-220667

- To Schmittner here:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/11/ice-age-constraints-on-climate-sensitivity/comment-page-1/#comment-220701

- Nathan Urban links new study with CS ~3C here:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/11/ice-age-constraints-on-climate-sensitivity/comment-page-2/#comment-220794

SkS:

http://www.skepticalscience.com/Schmittner-climate-sensitivity-goood-bad-ugly.html

[Maurizio Morabito]

As usual, there is zero relationship between the topic of the post and what bbd has managed to make the number one commenting topic.

This brings me back to the Mann point...the issue is not how bad his mental illness is, rather why Jones and friends were so eager to be lead by the nose by such a character, a stranger from far away. There has to be an email or two where the new "In Mann We Trust" policy is discussed.

[Markus]

BBD

that is a lot of staff, I try to respond in 3 parts.

The issue with Santer 2008 and the IPCC AR5 ZOD is not "reliability of observational data".

Satellite tropospheric temperature data and ground measured temperatures both agree very well over the last 30 years. The problem is, climate models tell us they should not, and satellite trends should be much higher than HadCrut3, GISS etc.

http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/uah/offset:0.2/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1979

Only in 1998, during the Super El Nino, there was a remarkable overshooting in satellite temperatures, just as climate models would have expected.

Every climate scientist should now immediately know, what that means for trend comparisons when the observational data ends right after the Super El Nino, as in Santer's anomalously reviewed paper. That is also not an accusation of dishonesty.

The new, more important issue is, of course, why the IPCC AR5 ZOD now only reports Santer's result with old 1999 data but not the climate model breakdown with updated data in McKittrick 2009.
This is a very significant issue, because climate models significantly fail to reproduce todays temperature trends in a large part of the observation space.

As they also fail to reproduce climate variability of the last millenia, wouldn't that suggest to eliminate a significant number of "very likelys" from the report this time, as long as those had been based in full or partly on disfunctional climate models ?

[Skiphil]

Since the original topic of this thread was about Michael Mann and The Team "poisoning the well" in relation to requests for data, I thought some might find the latest MM quotation of interest (see below). He is quoted in a NY Times article (about the raid on Tallbloke) expressing great confidence that police authorities must be relying upon some "actionable intelligence" to conduct such a raid.

I submit that even allowing for the usual strutting bluster this is yet another example of a a petty, mendacious mind (MM) which does not pause to reason carefully about all the possible hypotheses and explanations.

I for one can think of a variety of possible explanations (distinct but potentially inter-related) for the raid on Tallbloke which do not involve any "actionable intelligence" such as (1) political pressure being brought to bear, (2) someone higher up in the police wanting to appear to "do something"... (3) a long-stalled investigation which desperately needs a fresh start, (4) a complete lack of "actionable intelligence" which made authorities want to take steps to try to shake loose/dig up some kind of lead, any lead at all.... etc. My point is not that any of these (or other) hypotheses is the most plausible (I really don't pretend to know) but that MM knows less than nothing about the investigation yet seems to imagine he "knows" and can "infer" a great deal. Ignorance plus bombast are a dangerous combination.

We see with this quotation to the NY Times that Michael Mann (quotation below) yet again displays a politicized shallow mind that seizes prematurely upon whatever supposed "explanation" ***feels*** convenient to his petty world. He does not impress me as someone with any scientific, logical, or rigorous cast of mind.

==================================================================

Police Inquiry Prompts New Speculation on Who Leaked Climate-Change E-Mails
By LESLIE KAUFMAN
Published: January 1, 2012

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/02/science/earth/new-speculation-on-who-leaked-climate-change-e-mails.html?_r=1&ref=lesliekaufman

...It set off six separate official inquiries, all of which cleared the researchers of scientific misconduct....

....

“It seems to me the authorities wouldn’t have acted without some actionable intelligence,” said Michael Mann, a scientist at Pennsylvania State University who specializes in climate modeling and whose messages came in for particular scrutiny in 2009. “They must know something that we don’t yet know.”

[johanna]

What would Mann know about 'actionable intelligence'?

However, since he has chosen to share his views on this topic, it will be interesting to see what the outcome of TB's action regarding the basis for the search and seizure at his house goes. If the definition of 'actionable intelligence' extends to tallbloke's modest blog, imagine the sort of scrutiny Mann should be under. Although, it may be that 'actionable intelligence' is hard to find in that case.

[Skiphil]

.... and of course the "actionable intelligence" assertion (couched with the certainty that authorities "must" possess such info) would be especially risible if speculations that CRU/UAE know perfectly well that it's an inside job should prove correct.

I don't feel any confident belief about any of the proposed explanations (partly because I don't follow the Climategate intricacies closely enough), but I'm simply amazed at how blithely MM can assert what authorities ***must*** know or do.

I do not regard him as a careful scientist, but rather as a political activist who happened to learn a bunch of science along the way because it seemed useful to "The Cause"....

He speaks here as "spin-masters" in US politics (of all sides) typically speak to the media, of what they wish were true and what they want to try to foist upon the public beliefs.... rather than carefully following evidence and reasoning wherever it may lead.

[Maurizio Morabito]

would anybody be surprised if we were to hear that the "actionable intelligence" came from a professor at Penn State, known for his conspiratorial/paranoid/know-it-all/narcissistic mindset?

Is Michael linked to any powerful politician in the USA?

[Markus]

BBD
"Citing a single, controversial study by Shaviv is not enough."

There are controversial views about the cosmic ray theory, though against increasing evidence, but I did not notice objections to Shaviv 2005.

You probably refer to Shaviv/Veizer 2003 and the "critique" by Rahmstorf and several other non experts in Eos Journal.

Shaviv/Veizer's replys are well worth a read

http://www.phys.huji.ac.il/~shaviv/Ice-ages/GSAToday.pdf
http://www.phys.huji.ac.il/~shaviv/ClimateDebate/RahmstorfDebate.pdf
http://www.phys.huji.ac.il/~shaviv/ClimateDebate/RahmReplyReply.pdf

After this exercise, I don't see any substantial criticism left that legitimates the word "controversial" at least for these long time scales. Rahmstorf et al's final straw of "statistical insignificance" is in severe contrast to the evidence from figure 1 in the original paper. It is in fact the most significant correlation between any climate variable and a radiative forcing proxy on a time scale longer than a few million years.

But this is climate science, for the record, there is still a controversy, just as Michael Mann denies to the present day the upside down interpretation of Tiljander sediments. The disturbing issue is, of course, that the original authors were denied the final word in Eos.

[crosspatch]

It's all a waste of time anyway. We know with 100% certainty that a 2 degree rise in temperature will not cause a global environmental catastrophe because 7000 years ago climate was 2 degrees warmer than today and all the species now alive survived it.

We also know with certainty that a 5 degree rise in temperatures won't result in a global environmental catastrophe either because the last interglacial was 5 degrees warmer than now and very nearly all species alive now survived it (most of the ones that didn't survive died off in the last glacial period or as we were coming out of it).

[Markus]

BBD

"Citing a single, controversial study by Shaviv is not enough."

Now, what does this single study mean for sensitivity ?

First answer, as climate models failed and IPCC's understanding of the climate of the past is wrong, it may be too early to immediately readdress the final question of climate sensitivity.

Second answer

A lot.

This study is not an "outlier" that may be conveniently overrun by a large number of other studies with different results, because most other studies are not independent.

If the cosmic ray link exists, most of those other studies are wrong and have to be redone with that new overlooked contributor, and that includes sensitivity from ice age data analysis, millenia temperature data analysis and from climate model runs.

Only the short term energy budget analysis of Spencer or Lindzen/Choi may still be valid, but their low sensitivities are in good agreement with Shaviv 2005 anyways.

[John Shade]

BBD is struggling a bit here, as evidenced by his ill-natured tone at times. I must say I am dismayed by his frequent deferral to the phony authority of consensus, and his approach to discussion which is often one of jab and retire, rather than one of keen engagement - even with those comments which address questions, or assertions, raised by him.

The contrast with Markus is clear as he demonstrates both courtesy and a direct engagement with topics raised.

I think BBD does however, serve a useful purpose here by providing us with glimpses into the attitudes of someone who has been seriously alarmed by the tales of CO2-driven disasters to come, and who is concerned that others have not paid them sufficient heed. His is a naive, but readily adopted position given the level of alarming stories that have been enjoyed by the media and exploited by numerous pressure groups for various causes, as well as by those pursuing a clear financial interest such as carbon traders and the harvesters of subsidies for renewables. His most detailed response on this thread, is a little belated (Jan 1, 2012 at 10:28 PM) but is also revealing of a naive trust in perpetrators of the alarmist position: Hansen and RealClimate in particular.

The patient dismantling of this by Markus is admirable. I for one am finding their exchanges very informative and helpful.

I have also found a great many other insightful comments on this thread, from Skiphil, johanna and others. I just wish I could keep up! Actually, this whole site is a real treasure-trove of stuff worth reading.

[BBD]

Markus

The issue with Santer 2008 and the IPCC AR5 ZOD is not "reliability of observational data".

Yes, it is. There are questions about the reliability of tropospheric temperature estimates derived from satellite-flown instruments. There is no MSU for lower tropospheric measuremens so they are synthesised by further processing of the data for the mid troposphere. Vinnikov & Grody (2005) calculate a decadal trend of 0.2C 1979 - 2004. There is every chance that the UAH/RSS estimates may be biased cool. It seems more likely than the alternative: that the entire understanding of atmospheric physics is wrong.

Every climate scientist should now immediately know, what that means for trend comparisons when the observational data ends right after the Super El Nino, as in Santer's anomalously reviewed paper. That is also not an accusation of dishonesty.

Please see Foster & Rahmstorf (2011) which shows an unambiguous warming trend 1979 - present when the effects of ENSO, volcanism and solar variation are removed from the .

As they [models] also fail to reproduce climate variability of the last millenia,

I keep coming across this claim. Can you provide a reference for it? Models cannot anticipate changes in TSI or volcanic aerosol loading, so how can they hindcast the MWP or the LIA? As I say, references required.

You have ignored 99% of what I actually said at Jan 1, 2012 at 10:28 PM so I will return the discourtesy. However, in your many responses, you did say this:

Only the short term energy budget analysis of Spencer or Lindzen/Choi may still be valid, but their low sensitivities are in good agreement with Shaviv 2005 anyways.

First, there is exactly zero evidence that GCRs are the cause of modern warming. Neither Shaviv nor Svensmark has come anywhere close to demonstrating this. Second, Spencer and Lindzen are profoundly isolated in their belief in a low CS. This is because their attempts to demonstrate a mechanism do not stand up to scrutiny. I reached the point some time ago where I switch off when someone starts going on about Lindzen and/or Spencer.

In summary:

- Your belief in a low CS is a product of your emotional stance on AGW.

- It is in direct disagreement with the best current scientific understanding.

- It is in conflict with your ideas about the degree of past climate variability.

And you did not even acknowledge this central question, never mind answer it, so I will repeat it once again:

The question I have about Shaviv and Svensmark is simple: why isn't it warmer than it is? What's happening to the radiative forcing from CO2? It should be operating in addition to the increase in DSW from reduced cloud cover.

End note:

Here is an incomplete list of replies in the literature to Lindzen starting with his 'infra-red iris' hypothesis (Lindzen et al. 2001):

Hartmann & Michelsen (2002)

http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/1520-0477%282002%29083%3C0249%3ANEFI%3E2.3.CO%3B2

Lin et al. (2002)

http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/1520-0442%282002%29015%3C0003%3ATIHANO%3E2.0.CO%3B2

Harrison (2002)

http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1175%2F1520-0477(2002)083%3C0597%3ACODTEH%3E2.3.CO%3B2

Fu et al (2002)

http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/2/31/2002/acp-2-31-2002.html

Critiques of Lindzen and Choi (2009):

Trenberth et al. (2010)

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2010/2009GL042314.shtml

Lin et al. (2010)

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022407310001226

Murphy et al. (2010)

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2010/2010GL042911.shtml

Dessler (2010)

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/330/6010/1523.abstract

Critiques of Lindzen & Choi (2011):

Dessler (2011) (also addresses Spencer & Braswell 2011):

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/pip/2011GL049236.shtml

[BBD]

John Shade

BBD is struggling a bit here, as evidenced by his ill-natured tone at times.

Has it ever occurred to you that I just get fed up with hearing variants on the 'sceptic' version of reality? Or with those who will not read, or prefer a partial, parrot-like grasp of a topic to the overview?

The only thing Markus is patiently dismantling is the remnant of his own credibility.

[BBD]

Markus

You probably refer to Shaviv/Veizer 2003 and the "critique" by Rahmstorf and several other non experts* in Eos Journal.

You've encouraged me to do some reading.

Much (all?) seems to rest on whether Shaviv has demonstrated a correlation between GCRs and climate on a geological timescale. Specifically, between increases in GCRs during the transits of the solar system through the spiral arms of the galaxy and episodes of glaciation. Recent improvements in the understanding of the structure of the galaxy may have rendered his argument obsolete. For example, see Overholt et al. (2009):

From the abstract:

We re-examine past suggestions of a close link between terrestrial climate change and the Sun’s transit of spiral arms in its path through the Milky Way galaxy. These links produced concrete fits, deriving the unknown spiral pattern speed from terrestrial climate correlations. We test these fits against new data on spiral structure based on CO data that do not make simplifying assumptions about symmetry and circular rotation. If we compare the times of these transits with changes in the climate of Earth, the claimed correlations not only disappear, but we also find that they cannot be resurrected for any reasonable pattern speed.

And the main text:

Although previous work found a correlation between the 140 Myr climate cycle on the Earth and the intersection with spiral arms (Shaviv 2003, Shaviv & Veizer 2003; Svensmark 2006), with new data on the structure of the Galaxy, this correlation disappears. We have used a new model of the large-scale gas distribution in the Galaxy, using a velocity deconvolution of CO and Hi line data based on self-consistently computed, non-circular gas flows in the inner Galaxy (Bissantz et al. 2003; Pohl et al. 2008; Englmaier et al. 2009). In contrast to many published studies, this model does not force azimuthal symmetry into the spiral-arm structure. The asymmetry of the arms near the solar circle erases any correlation to the 140 Myr cycle and any periodic trend less than the orbital period of our solar system relative to the spiral pattern as a whole. This would be greater than 500 Myr for the previously fit pattern speed. Even if we allow the pattern speed to vary, it will not be less than the
orbital period of the Sun, which is still longer than the 140 Myr cycle in question. The asymmetry of the new galactic picture could create a correlation between the spiralarm crossings and any non-periodic event by varying the pattern speed. We conclude that, based on these new data, there is no evidence to suggest any correlation between the transit of our solar system through the spiral arms of our Galaxy and the terrestrial climate.

*Overton and co-authors are astrophysicists, so hopefully qualify as 'experts'.

[Okes]

Re: Gary Gutting.

I disagree with his conclusions for various reasons. Let´s get started:

"It follows that a nonexpert who wants to reject A.G.W. can do so only by arguing that climate science lacks the scientific status needed be taken seriously in our debates about public policy."

Let´s put aside that a "non-expert" of reasonable intelligence and aptitude can certainly point out when an expert says "2+2=5" (or, say, uses upside-down proxies). Instead, let´s examine what exactly "science" is, and why it is socially valuable.

"There may well be areas of inquiry (e.g., various sub-disciplines of the social sciences) open to this sort of critique."

There is no hard difference between (various sub-disciplines of the) "social sciences" and "other sciences". The reason that the social sciences have many serious and well-recognized problems relate not to some inherent flaw in the methodology of the social sciences overall (although such flaws certainly exist in various areas), but the large problem rather stems from the fact that human nature and human societies, and the interaction of these, is by their nature very causally dense, I.e. it is simply hard to disentangle causal relationships.

Furthermore, the social sciences relate to things that people care intensely about on a fundamental level (power, sex, politics etc.), unlike say, quarks.

Now, the reason that "Science" as a brand name is a strong brand (that covers a wide range of activities), is that the term stands for a wide range of social institutions and norms that aim to make the pursuit of empirical truth easier, and the suppression of empirical truth harder. These institutions have overall proven to be very useful in obtaining useful information (as noted, with some exceptions), and hence the term has a lot of status in society at large.

Now, in practice, these norms and institutions manifest as, for instance:

- Ad rem, you at least are expected to pretend to be arguing the actual point of contention, not the bodily odor of those that disagree with you.

- Anonymous peer review, which at least in theory is supposed to thwart personal politics influencing what gets published.

- Tenure. You are not supposed to get fired for what you argue is true.

- Openness and reproducibility.

- Independence. Science and scientists are expected to be sheltered from political interference in their research.

All of these safeguards against human nature are supposed to ensure that (for instance) when a consensus emerges in a field of study, that consensus is the result of open and frank discussion, debate, experimentation, etc., and not an outcome of a system based on fear and deference to authority (as fear-based systems are generally superior when it comes to the production of consensus).

Etc. etc.

" But there does not seem to be a promising case against the scientific authority of climate science. "

On the contrary, based on the factors underlying the success and prestige of "science" overall, I believe that there is a strong, indeed a unique, case to be made that climate science systematically undermines most pillars of the success and prestige of science.

- Ad hominem. "Deniers", "flat-earthers", "tobacco scientists", "shills for industry", exploding polar bears, exploding school kids, etc. etc, all magnified through a pliant and impartial (ho ho!) media. Rarely has there been a scientific field that brings us so many innovations in the field of insult.

From Mr. Mann to Mr. BBD in this thread, the personal insults start flowing from the word "go". This is not a coincidence, but simply represents the culture of the field.

- Anonymous peer review. This is the field that brought us instant turnaround pal review. Unless you are in the wrong camp, of course, in which case it is time for "the gauntlet".

- If you dislike something that is published, the natural response is not to reply regarding the topic of discussion, but to launch a conspiracy to fire the editor of the offending journal.

- Hide your data and methodology to the greatest degree possible, even to the point of breaking the law. Have you spotted a serious mistake by another scientist in one of his papers? Then you shut up, hunker down, and grumble to colleagues. Omerta is the natural expectation.

Is a contrary argument posted in your comments section by a knowledgeable and polite individual? Delete immediately.

- And finally, the real whooper. In what other field of science is there an official "intergovernmental" body that produces a consensus report every few years? An organization that is not merely "political", but is actually directly run by politicians? The answer is "very few".

It is not shocking that a field that is dominated completely by a political organization with a direct mandate to produce a consensus has an unusually strong consensus. It is the opposite that would be surprising.

Of course, the strength of the manufactured consensus is then in turn wielded as a weapon when it is time to justify the vilification of opponents, the abandonment of good scientific practice, the petty conspiracies against deviants, the secrecy, the silencing of opposing arguments, petty criminality, and so on. All activities which (naturally) in turn further strengthen the force of the consensus.

So, in short, climate science is not open to the same critique as "various sub-disciplines of the social sciences". Climate Science represents something far more malign than any field or sub-field in the social sciences.

[John Shade]

Okes (Jan 3, 2012 at 8:48 AM) - Bravo!

The hope that we might achieve a decent disentangling of how this sorry state of affairs came about is, in my opinion, the best hope that some good will come from it. The a good result will be that future generations will possess a clear and well-documented warning of a dangerous vulnerability of our political systems, national and international. A great result will be that these generations will develop a robustness to ill-founded, highly-orchestrated scaremongering leaning on shoddy work labelled 'science' and on profoundly inadequate computer models treated as authoritative oracles.

[John Shade]

BBD, I think 'render obsolete' is a little strong here. (by the way, your link to Overholt, Melott and Pohl did not work for me, but this one did: http://iopscience.iop.org/1538-4357/705/2/L101/pdf/1538-4357_705_2_L101.pdf).

First, because of the odious nature of climate science as alluded to by Okes above, and illuminated by the CG1 and CG2 revelations, I am forced to note that the study was financed by NASA and had a prompt publishing track from submission to publication.

Second, I note we have our old friend the 'computer model' being brought into play. This time to model spiral arm locations
'Themodels chosen take into consideration newcriteria for spiral
arms that do not force-fit them to logarithmic arcs (Englmaier
et al. 2009). These models are based on the density of CO gas,
which was recently modeled using a gas-flow model derived
from smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) simulations in
gravitational potentials based on theNIR luminosity distribution
of the bulge and disk (Bissantz et al. 2003).'

Third, Shaviv is reported (see comment by Sylvain here: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/08/04/a-link-between-the-sun-cosmic-rays-aerosols-and-liquid-water-clouds-appears-to-exist-on-a-global-scale/ ) to have responded to what seems to have been an earlier version of this work, classed as Melott et al. (http://arxiv.org/abs/0906.2777v1) - I have not had time to check for any differences. The report of Shaviv's initial reactions includes this:

'1 – Melott assumes only one pattern speed for the spiral structure, and therefore do not consider the dynamics which shows that it is a pattern composed of 2 spiral arms with one pattern speed + 4 arms with another. It so happens that they coincide at this point in time. e.g., look at this paper: http://www.phys.huji.ac.il/%7Eshaviv/articles/NaozShaviv.pdf (full ref: http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2007NewA…12..410N ) It also happens that the 2-armed structure is almost co-rotating with the solar system.
In fact, assuming that the milky way has a very complicated pattern (different number of arms, very antisymmetric, etc., and assuming that it can rotate like a rigid pattern with one pattern speed, for many 10^8 years, is unrealistic.
2 – The Melott analysis is not consistent with the Spitzer reconstruction, nor it is consistent with the CRF variations observed in Iron meteorites. (Spitzer: http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2009PASP..121..213C Iron meteorites: http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2003NewA….8…39S )
3 – The Melott analysis is based on the spiral arm reconstruction of Englmaier et al. However, there are a few critical problems with the way they do it. In particular, they assume there is an arm in a region in which they see no arm in the density plot, and they ignore an arm passage through a region where the gas map shows a clear elongated concentration. This can be seen in the attached figure (it is composed of the original density plot + arms denoted by Englmaier et al., plus the solar system trajectory according to Melott et al.. Note the location of the solar system is not exactly the same!!! The yellow dots denote passages according to Melott et al., including a passage through something which was dented as an arm but without the density concentration to support it. The red dot denotes a passage through an arm like condensation but not denoted by Melott.
4 – Melott et al. don’t inlcude additional effects on the trajectory, that the potential is not cylindrically symmetric (the arms introduce something of order a 10% correction. They also don’t include the effect of orbital parameter diffusion.'

Now the above remarks attributed in a blog comment to Shaviv do not constitute a scientific reference, but I include them here merely to illustrate that we have here a topic for scientific discussion, and not a 'rendering obsolete'.

So it looks to me that this paper is a relevant contribution, probably worth publishing, that draws attention to an assumption of symmetric spiral arms apparently used to support correlations with climate events. It turns out that these arms are not so symmetric when modelled via the CO data and associated simulations.

Finally, it what is already a rather longish comment, I would note that this brief checking up on a reference purporting to 'refute', 'render obsolete', or some other dramatic claim by those troubled by CO2, has led to something I have found time and again: reliance on computer models and/or nothing like the support implied for alarm.

[BBD]

JS

First, don't put words into my mouth. I did not say 'refute'. I said 'may render obsolete'. This is not a 'dramatic claim' and the attempted mischaracterisation is petty and irritating.

Second, before typing, read:

Shaviv's primary objection to Melott:

1 – Melott assumes only one pattern speed for the spiral structure, and therefore do not consider the dynamics which shows that it is a pattern composed of 2 spiral arms with one pattern speed + 4 arms with another.

From Overholt et al. (2009):

If we compare the times of these transits with changes in the climate of Earth, the claimed correlations not only disappear, but we also find that they cannot be resurrected for any reasonable pattern speed.

[...]

The asymmetry of the arms near the solar circle erases any correlation to the 140 Myr cycle and any periodic trend less than the orbital period of our solar system relative to the spiral pattern as a whole. This would be greater than 500 Myr for the previously fit pattern speed. Even if we allow the pattern speed to vary, it will not be less than the orbital period of the Sun, which is still longer than the 140 Myr cycle in question. The asymmetry of the new galactic picture could create a correlation between the spiralarm crossings and any non-periodic event by varying the pattern speed. We conclude that, based on these new data, there is no evidence to suggest any correlation between the transit of our solar system through the spiral arms of our Galaxy and the terrestrial climate.

I chose those quotes in my original comment for a reason. Try not to let your desperation to defend someone else's crumbling argument blind you to the facts.

One other thing. Computer models are an essential part of modern science. Attempting to claim otherwise just makes you look biased and weakens your argument.

Now, why don't you find some astrophysicists who agree with Shaviv? Can you do that...?

[BBD]

JS

Since you are intent on weighing in here, perhaps you could answer the question that nobody seems to want to touch:

The problem I have with Shaviv and Svensmark is simple: if GCRs are responsible for modern warming, then why isn't it much warmer? What is happening to the radiative forcing from CO2? It should be operating in addition to the increase in DSW from reduced cloud cover.

Where's the 'missing energy'?

[James P]

BBD

"the best current scientific understanding"

And who decides that? I'm not trying to trivialise - I just question the term 'best', as I fear it may be debatable. The best living scientist I know of is Freeman Dyson, but I may be biased, as my Dad was at Winchester with him...

[John Shade]

You are a grumpy old chap, BBD. I was generalising about the references deployed by those agitated by CO2 to refute their critics. I could also have added that as well as finding their references only very weakly or in some case even contradicting their claims, I generally find that those self-same agitees do not immediately express their gratitude for receiving my help to help calm them down. I do believe you too have not enjoyed my altruism...

I think maybe just more Horlicks and the passage of time will do the trick as Mother Nature continues to make a mockery of all the alarmists scare stories capable of verification to date. It really does look as if additional CO2 is of such little consequence on the climate that we shall be hard put to detect its effects - pretty much just as Lindzen, for example, pointed out many years ago.

If you enjoy the frisson of alarm and the drama of sounding the tocsin, BBD, I fear you have chosen the wrong topic. Why not switch to the more substantial risk of severe harm arising from the diversion of resources into renewables? Or the political poison of having developing country politicians blame the West for their droughts, flood, and famines? Or the uncounted schoolchildren being deliberately frightened about their future by ruthless eco-activists in search of recruits? Your 'missing energy' is a chimera. Their plight is real.

[BBD]

JS

I do believe you too have not enjoyed my altruism...

Who do you think you are kidding? You make not one solitary point. It's just patronising flannel.

So, we've now established that:

- Shaviv appears to be in error and his ideas are not supported within the astrophysics community

- You cannot resolve the mystery of why there is no combined GCR/CO2 RF heating effect

It really does look as if additional CO2 is of such little consequence on the climate that we shall be hard put to detect its effects - pretty much just as Lindzen, for example, pointed out many years ago.

Would that be the same Lindzen who cannot demonstrate any plausible mechanism to support his belief in a low climate sensitivity?

Since you appear to have missed it the first time, here is an incomplete list of replies in the literature to Lindzen starting with his 'infra-red iris' hypothesis (Lindzen et al. 2001):

Hartmann & Michelsen (2002)

http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/1520-0477%282002%29083%3C0249%3ANEFI%3E2.3.CO%3B2

Lin et al. (2002)

http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/1520-0442%282002%29015%3C0003%3ATIHANO%3E2.0.CO%3B2

Harrison (2002)

http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1175%2F1520-0477(2002)083%3C0597%3ACODTEH%3E2.3.CO%3B2

Fu et al (2002)

http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/2/31/2002/acp-2-31-2002.html

Critiques of Lindzen and Choi (2009):

Trenberth et al. (2010)

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2010/2009GL042314.shtml

Lin et al. (2010)

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022407310001226

Murphy et al. (2010)

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2010/2010GL042911.shtml

Dessler (2010)

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/330/6010/1523.abstract

Critiques of Lindzen & Choi (2011):

Dessler (2011) (also deals with Spencer & Braswell 2011):

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/pip/2011GL049236.shtml

Perhaps your patronising tone is... misplaced.

[John Shade]

BBD, I did not really think you would be grateful. Not right away at least. Perhaps in x years time you might remember my efforts with a sigh, e.g. as in

Child Grandpa, Grandpa, we've had another lesson at school about 'Silly Science, Silly Laws'
BBD (for it is he): 'Go away, I don't want to hear about it.'
Child 'But it was so funny. I can't believe what you people fell for in the olden days! '
BBD: 'I'm going out fishing at our ice hole. I'll try to get us a fish for the summer solstice. Don't forget to do some pedalling to charge up the stove before I get back'

But to get back to today. Your remark about Shaviv is out of all proportion to what we have covered. My point was merely that normal scientific discussion was underway. (by the way, the paper you quote was published several months after the one to which his purported comments applied - it would be instructive to see if the authors had benefitted from those comments. I hope they did - that would be an example of the scientific process at work. Perhaps Shaviv also learned something from their efforts. All well and good.)

Your enjoyment of a mysterious lack of a 'combined GCR/CO2 RF heating effect' catches my attention. I daresay the climate system is choc a bloc with effects which we are so far unable to reliably disentangle. In some cases due to confounding, in others due to the sought-for effect being so small compared to other effects. I'd put any overall heating (or cooling) from additional CO2 into the latter category at present, given the absence of anything unusual going on with weather anywhere.

You give me a list of 9 references to read, and I tentatively thank you for them. Bear with me a moment and I'll explain the 'tentatively'. I recall times when people extremely alarmed about CO2 have have pushed such lists at me much as a witch doctor would push and rattle his stick of charms, confident that they would drive off some evil spirit. I think for many, perhaps not you BBD, intent on saving mankind from itself do incline to the view that any who ask them to pause must indeed be evil spirits. Who else would not want to save the world? But if you take these charms and examine them more closely, you find nothing powerful at all - nothing that would either drive away the bad guys or persuade the neutral observer that there were good grounds to be alarmed about increasing CO2 levels.

I will give you the benefit of the doubt, and take a look at each of your references. But I'll need a good few hours for that, depending on my familiarity and their availability - I wouldn't want to pay for any of them, given my jaded expectations of what they might be like. I'll try to get this done this month, but no promises. In the meantime, I thank you for your efforts to help me. Or drive me away...

[BBD]

JS

I daresay the climate system is choc a bloc with effects which we are so far unable to reliably disentangle. In some cases due to confounding, in others due to the sought-for effect being so small compared to other effects. I'd put any overall heating (or cooling) from additional CO2 into the latter category at present, given the absence of anything unusual going on with weather anywhere.

Astonishing. On what basis do you make this assertion? Please reference your sources, and also give your estimate of surface forcing (W/m^2) for 550 ppmv CO2.

The links are all to abstracts. This was in order to provide a quick overview. I will be very happy to provide the same set of links to (free) downloadable pdfs if you want.

[John Shade]

BBD, I've got some of the references so far, but the bill for the ones I'd need to pay for would be over $200 so far. I've also had difficulty in reaching some. I'll summarise the details when I get a chance, but if you happen to pass this way before then, I would appreciate your posting links to downloadable pdfs. Thanks in anticipation!

[BBD]

John Shade

These are the links I have used - if any are broken, just google [author year pdf] - there are free copies out there. I hope this helps.

Responses to Lindzen et al. (2001):

Hartmann & Michelsen (2002)
http://www.atmos.washington.edu/~dennis/IRIS_BAMS.pdf

Lin et al. (2002)
http://clouds.eos.ubc.ca/~phil/courses/eosc582/iris_articles/wiris1.pdf

Harrison (2002)
http://ams.allenpress.com/archive/1520-0477/83/4/pdf/i1520-0477-83-4-597.pdf

Fu et al (2002)
http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/2/31/2002/acp-2-31-2002.pdf

Responses to Lindzen & Choi (2009)/Spencer & Braswell (2009):

Trenberth et al. (2010)
http://www.atmosp.physics.utoronto.ca/~jclub/journalclub_files/trenberth2010.pdf

Lin et al. (2010)
http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/10/1923/2010/acp-10-1923-2010.pdf

Murphy & Forster (2010)
- nope; you'll have to pay for this one :-( ...but - there's a discussion at Science of Doom here:
http://scienceofdoom.com/2011/12/23/measuring-climate-sensitivity-part-two-mixed-layer-depths/

Dessler (2010)
http://geotest.tamu.edu/userfiles/216/dessler10b.pdf

Responses to Lindzen & Choi (2011)/Spencer & Braswell (2011):

Dessler (2011)
http://geotest.tamu.edu/userfiles/216/Dessler2011.pdf

[John Shade]

Thanks BBD. I hope to download those tomorrow, and start working through them a bit each day from now on and the others I have already.

[John Shade]

Thanks BBD, I managed to download all but two from your second lists. The two 'Not Found' are:

Lin et al. (2002)
http://clouds.eos.ubc.ca/~phil/courses/eosc582/iris_articles/wiris1.pdf

Harrison (2002)
http://ams.allenpress.com/archive/1520-0477/83/4/pdf/i1520-0477-83-4-597.pdf

So much is going on now, it will be later this month at the earliest before I expect to get back to this. I have other discussions or news items with non-anonymous people which I am giving priority to. But I have not forgotten your stuff, and I hope to learn something it in due course.

[John Shade]

BBD, whoever and wherever you are (I still think you might be PG!), I write to say I am still looking at the references, but I am despairing of having the time to really study them. I have very much enjoyed the two key papers by Lindzen and others, one of which in particular (the one about the Iris idea) was delightful as an example of scientific speculation and opening up ideas for critical review. I have not got far with the other papers yet, except to note that none of them seem to qualify as complete rebuttals as you seem to believe.

Anyway, whereas in my conceit I thought it would take me a few weeks to get into them, I find it will be an occasional project for the rest of the year. I am just too readily distracted by more superficial matters - the doings of politicians and educators and propagandists - which is where I might reasonably have some hope to adding something of value. I do not expect to do that with hard science, but I do enjoy trying to get to grips with it.