Jones live blog

No more questions

2nd Monckton - asking about 60yr perioddicity and PDO. Can we detect AGW. PJ says yes.

1st question Tony Kelly of GWPF. Sea temps fundamentally different to land. Should measure marine air temp. Says sst doesn't agree to land. PJ says SST correlated to marine air temp

Questions next

And that's it

Satellites - same results as surface

SST - bucket adjustment is the most important. Also shift to buoys

Discussion of CRU subsampling studies - still get same result

BEST 2% series shown. We are getting the message that all the series show roughly the same thing.

homgeneity/urbanisation  adjusts have small effect

CRUTEM4 will include a full release of station data

adjustments to stations makes little difference at large scales

"Population growth is not a great metric for urbanisation trends"

Urbanisation. Little difference in urban/rural

Biases in order of importance form Jones and Wigley. 1 SST bucket 2. Thermometer ecposure, 3. Urbanisation

Some discussion of Menne et al 2009 - bimodal distribution of adjusts

PJ discussing homogenity issues

We've been told we will be evicted if we mention climategate

Lovely Georgian theatre here.

Comments

[phi]

BBD,

I'm sorry if you think that but I do not see what you're referring to. You mean the study of glaciers that would contradict my arguments about the evolution of temperatures in the twentieth century?

I told you I did not find very convincing methodology. In addition, by studying the graph 5-9, what are we seeing ?

1945 - 1955: slope of about 7 per year.
1995 - 2005: slope of about 7 per year.

If we assume that the mass balance is well correlated with temperature, this means that the temperatures of the two decades are similar and strengthens the hypothesis of a general stability of temperatures in the twentieth century.

Where is the nonsense ?

[BBD]

phi

Sorry if I misunderstood. It sounded like snark.

Why are you ignoring this:

The global averages (i, ii, iii) reveal strong ice losses in the first decade after the start of the measurements in 1946, slowing down in the second decade (1956–65), followed by a moderate mass loss between 1966 and 1985, and a subsequent acceleration of ice loss until present (Fig. 5.8 a—f). The mean of the 30 continuous ‘reference’ series yields an annual mass loss of 0.58 m water equivalent (m w.e.) for the decade 1996–2005, which is more than twice the loss rate of the previous decade (1986–95: 0.25 m w.e.), and over four times the rate for the period 1976–85 (0.14 m w.e.).

This increase in ice loss compared to earlier periods is absolutely vital, and contradicts your assumption here:

If we assume that the mass balance is well correlated with temperature, this means that the temperatures of the two decades are similar and strengthens the hypothesis of a general stability of temperatures in the twentieth century.

I do understand your point (a good one) about comparing the trends at the beginning and end of the cumulative data analysis but sometimes trends are not the only important factors. In the case of MBC, cumulative analysis illustrates this very clearly indeed.

In the earlier discussion of the validity of GATA to GATA comparison between surface and TLT, trends were central to the debate. Not so with MBC. Again, surely this is obvious?

[BBD]

Sorry:

This increase in ice loss rate compared to earlier periods is absolutely vital, and contradicts your assumption here:

[Shub]

BBD
You are confusing station exposure to the effect of urbanization and land use change.

Secondly, you are back to your tricks again. You presuppose that I am making a claim, that counters your global warming theory. I am not. When I said:

"The urbanization/land use change, the poor exposure, plus 'global warming' and other influences conspire to produce the decadal trend."

...that is all I meant and nothing more. Is there anything in the above statement, that characterizes the relative contributions of the different factors to the TLT trend? No. But yet, although you do not clearly have any factual disagreement with the above statement, you simply dragged it to the TLT realm, as though it were meant to say anything about the tropospheric trend.

Moreover, seeing as you are 'fixated' (at the moment :)) on the TLT, there is no clear answer forthcoming on the absense of the hotspot anyway.

Let me use this opportunity to further the alternative perspective one more step:
[1] There is no global climate. Only a set of regional climates and systems. These are interconnected etc etc, but it does not mean there is no global climate. In fact, the existence of interacting regional climate and systems, if we pause and think, is in itself a strong argument against a global climate
[2] There is a globally averaged temperature anomaly. We can measure it. However, it is not clear what it says.
[3] In the GATA, different factors pull things in different directions and cancel out each other and it is not possible to 'cleanly' study their influences. These factors however may be significant at regional scales
[4] Putting all known factors into a model and trying to arrive a predicted understanding of the global system by computation may give number estimates of GATA, but as long as we don't know what it means, this information is correspondingly less useful
[5] There is no clear answer to the question that the GATA is meaningful but only at timescales that are irrelevant to humankind (i.e., century-scale, millenial-scale and beyond).

[phi]

BBD,

...but sometimes trends are not the only important factors.

Maybe. At least what I hear is that this study does not contradict my hypothesis. Do you agree with that?

[BBD]

phi

Actually, I'm not sure.

Here's what I said last night:

I suggest that it is like the surface GATA and TLT GATA. It's the big picture we need to see.

We could now go on to look at Arctic ice loss, or mass balance change in the Greenland ice sheet. (And yes, I'm familiar with the possibility raised by Wu et al. 2010 that incorrect GIA has introduced over-estimates of ice loss into interpretations of the GRACE data).

But wherever you look, and however sceptically you weigh the evidence, it all says the same thing. Of course the records are variously unreliable (pre-modern, especially so), potentially biased, or short. However, my guess is (/scientific method off) that the WGMS has it roughly right.

I'm a sceptic, but a rational sceptic, so I have to follow the dictates of reason.

There is too much observational evidence of accumulating energy within the climate system post-1950 to maintain that 'nothing's happening'.

Nevertheless, as I said at the outset, the trend divergence between UAH certainly seems interesting.

If I get a chance today I am going to replicate the graph you linked. Which data source did you use for UAH NH Land BTW? v5.3 or v5.4? And which channel did you use? I hope it was Aqua Ch5 600mb layer. If not, we may have a problem here.

And I need also to check where you acquired the GISTEMP NH Land station data.

Many thanks in advance.

[BBD]

Shub

You are confusing station exposure to the effect of urbanization and land use change

.

When and where? And more to the point, what difference does it make?

Secondly, you are back to your tricks again. You presuppose that I am making a claim, that counters your global warming theory. I am not.

It's not 'my' global warming theory. This is childish. Worse, you are wilfully ignoring the point.

When I said:

"The urbanization/land use change, the poor exposure, plus 'global warming' and other influences conspire to produce the decadal trend."

...that is all I meant and nothing more. Is there anything in the above statement, that characterizes the relative contributions of the different factors to the TLT trend? No. But yet, although you do not clearly have any factual disagreement with the above statement, you simply dragged it to the TLT realm, as though it were meant to say anything about the tropospheric trend.

I'm having a hard time believing this. The point, for the nth time, is that the rate of warming (trend) for the boundary layer is almost identical to that of the TLT. This requires (laws of physics) energy accumulation within the lower atmosphere. Even if we ignore the surface data entirely.

UHI, poor station siting and land use change may influence some thermometers but whatever the case, they do not and cannot explain the trend for TLT.

This requires considerable energetic accumulation within the climate system. Energetically insignificant effects such as UHI and poor station siting are irrelevant. Land use change is insufficient. Your argument lacks a sense of relative scale.

Most significantly, the use of scare quotes for 'global warming' shows what you are refusing to to acknowledge. Namely, the huge energy gap that needs explaining to account for the TLT trend. None of your obfuscatory and incorrect claims about surface processes have any bearing on this. They are diversionary tactics.

FWIW, I simply do not believe this statement:

You presuppose that I am making a claim, that counters your global warming theory. I am not.

Yes, you are and you have done nothing else for three days. You are strongly sceptical but apparently lack the courage to admit the fact. Is that because it would require dismissing this:

For some reason however, BBD insists that I confront the greenhouse demon with Occam's razor in hand, not 'move around a lot', etc. :)

It's called 'the scientific method'.

And this is where it leads:

Take the undisputed radiative physics of CO2.

Ask:

If more CO2 is added to the atmosphere will it

- do nothing

- cool

- warm

When you have considered that for a moment (with Occam's razor at your throat), perhaps you see my problem with your position.

May 13, 2011 at 6:27 PM

Moreover, seeing as you are 'fixated' (at the moment :)) on the TLT, there is no clear answer forthcoming on the absense of the hotspot anyway.

You still seem unaware that the hypothesised tropical hot-spot is very high up, around 10km, just below the tropopause. It does not show up in the Ch5 TLT data which measure T at 14,000ft. It is, essentially, not relevant to the surface GATA-to-TLT GATA trend comparisons I have made here. Another distraction tactic.

I've said all this time and again on this thread. And you've ignored it all.

Your argumentative 'technique' is now obvious. Simply ignore all contrary evidence and keep on and on and on. And by God it's wearing. But it doesn't make you right. Best understand that.

[Shub]

The point, for the nth time, is that the rate of warming (trend) for the boundary layer is almost identical to that of the TLT.

No, that is not the point.

Yes, I have done nothing for three days. That is because you think this is all supposed to lead somewhere. I don't think so, and I cannot see where to, as well.

What I am 'doing', if at all, is asking a few questions. Your answers are: "Yeah, but that doesn't matter to the question of greenhouse-driven great global warming theory anyway". To top it off, you have characterized this peculiar form of evasion as "the scientific method".

I just traced back our argument. It leads to one point, for example, where I asked you about why the NCDC land trend is 0.32C when the corresponding UAH trend is 0.16C. You 'answer' was to ask another question, i.e., about HADCrut and satellite? Indeed that is an interesting question, but it does not constitute an answer.

Moreover, your response for a land vs land comparision (which we had gotten into, considering the apples and pears question) was to once more, post a link to an 'unadjusted' global curve (i.e., HADCrut) and compare it to a global UAH curve?

How did you fancy/imagine that the global curve answered anything about the land discrepancy question that was being raised by me? (??)

Sure, it addressed the imaginary claim that land trends were raised by UHI, but who made that claim anyway? Not me. I was, and still am, asking the question: "Why is the land trend elevated like that (compared to satellite), and why are the uncorrected tropical thermometer poorly correlated with their corresponding satellite measures?" Just try answering this question without resorting to a "It doesn't matter" - that is what I am asking. I am learning stuff

Finally, I've been reading the relevant papers (all reviews). There is no indication that the question I was asking, is hardly "settled" as you want to claim. Coincidentally, WUWT just posted the Thorne et al paper I referred to. I wont say anything about what Anthony concluded.

[BBD]

What I am 'doing', if at all, is asking a few questions.

And never answering any.

[phi]

BBD,

UAH :
http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/t2lt/uahncdc.lt

GISS :
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/tabledata/NH.Ts.txt

Versions for the graph : nov. 2010.

[BBD]

Shub

Re your various remarks about AGW on this thread culminating in your quip about 'my' global warming theory. I'd forgotten about something Roger Pielke Jnr said in comments at RC:

Our paper [Klotzbach et al 2009] depends upon a warming trend accompanied by increasing greenhouse gas concentrations. It is perfectly consistent with anthropogenic greenhouse warming (in fact it depends on it), and may suggest a mechanism for better reconciling divergent temperature trends at the surface and lower troposphere (See Urs Neu above at #43). The details will be worked out in the literature and our work is certainly not the last word. That is how the peer review process works. I hope that Gavin does submit a comment as that is how science works.

Now, before you again start pretending that you are a neutral, objective observer, may I remind you that I do not believe you on this point.

[BBD]

phi

Excellent. Thanks. The main worry was the UAH data but it is TLT, it's updated to v5.4 1981 - 2010 baseline.

[BBD]

Shub (delayed response to the rest of your comment at 3:40pm above)...

Yesterday you agreed with Spencer's statement on global average temperature:

[...] the globally averaged temperature is not just a meaningless average of a bunch of unrelated numbers. This is because the temperature of any specific location on the Earth does not exist in isolation of the rest of the climate system. If you warm the temperature locally, you then will change the horizontal air pressure gradient, and therefore the wind which transports heat from that location to other locations. Those locations are in turn connected to others.

[...] the temperature of one location on the Earth is ultimately connected to all other locations on the Earth. As such, the globally averaged surface temperature — and its intimate connection to most of the atmosphere through convective overturning — is probably the single most important index of the state of the climate system we have the ability to measure.

May 12 12:03pm you say:

The passage you posted from Roy Spencer: I do agree with it. But, that is useful from a perspective of justifying the meaningfulness of a global average temperature.

But really, you don't agree, do you? Hence your subsequent attempt to claim that "There is no global climate" (see below).

So, Ice Ages aren't global climate events?

Well actually, they are. They are global climate (temperature) change expressed as varying regional effects. All of which are more or less extreme cooling.

Remember what Spencer says:

[T]he temperature of one location on the Earth is ultimately connected to all other locations on the Earth.

This is self-evidently correct, which simply highlights the internal contradiction in your claim that:

In fact, the existence of interacting regional climate and systems, if we pause and think, is in itself a strong argument against a global climate

I'm fed up with this now, so here's a quick run-through of your arguments. My comments in italic:

[1] There is no global climate. Only a set of regional climates and systems. These are interconnected etc etc, but it does not mean there is no [I take it you meant 'a'] global climate. In fact, the existence of interacting regional climate and systems, if we pause and think, is in itself a strong argument against a global climate

Nonsense, as discussed above

[2] There is a globally averaged temperature anomaly. We can measure it. However, it is not clear what it says.

Yes it is. It says global average temperatures are rising. And it accords with every other surface/tropospheric data set I can think of except Antarctic SSTs. These include all other major basin SSTs, OHC (not T, but increasing), land surface and TLT.

[3] In the GATA, different factors pull things in different directions and cancel out each other and it is not possible to 'cleanly' study their influences. These factors however may be significant at regional scales

Not what I was trying to do. As I have said a dozen times and more in this thread. While regional effects will differ, they will for the most part be driven by warming.

[4] Putting all known factors into a model and trying to arrive a predicted understanding of the global system by computation may give number estimates of GATA, but as long as we don't know what it means, this information is correspondingly less useful

Obfuscation. You are confusing observed GATA with the output from GCMs. We know what GATA is saying: warming - on a planetary scale. The models predict more of the same, but they over-estimate the decadal trend.

[5] There is no clear answer to the question that the GATA is meaningful but only at timescales that are irrelevant to humankind (i.e., century-scale, millenial-scale and beyond).

Nonsense. My child will be four in August. He will be 84 in 2091. The GATA now vs the GATA then will be relevant to him during his lifetime. You know this is true as well as I do.

[BBD]

phi

I almost forgot. The issue of ice melt (particularly NH ice melt) is examined by Judith Curry in a review of the literature beginning with what she describes as "the definitive paper on the history of Arctic sea ice" Polyak et al. 2010 PDF

There are many indicators that natural variability has a strong influence on the variability of sea ice extent on decadal to millennial timescales. IMO, the strongest argument for sea ice decline over the last decade for being unusual and at least in part attributable to global warming is this (from Polyakov et al.): The severity of present ice loss can be highlighted by the breakup of ice shelves at the northern coast of Ellesmere Island, which have been stable until recently for at least several thousand years based on geological data.

As I have argued: we need to see the big picture.

The divergence between NH land surface and NH TLT (above landmass) seems to be real (your graph appears correct - not that I doubted you, but I wanted to see for myself).

The explanation may lie with moist convective heat transport, which is expected to reduce over land as boundary layer T rises and major landmasses begin to dry at their centres.

Without the upward transport of energy the TLT warming trend will fall relative to the surface trend.

I do not endorse this, but it is worth thinking about carefully.

[BBD]

Not quite right. I should have said:

I do not endorse this or reject it, but it is worth thinking about carefully.

Link weirdness. I cannot find a working link for Polyak et al. 2010. Odd and irritating. Apologies.

[HaroldW]

BBD --
I haven't been following the thread -- perhaps I'll have time tomorrow to catch myself up -- but I think you're referring to this paper.

[BBD]

HaroldW

I am indeed. Thank you for providing the link. Much appreciated. I am still trying to understand why two different google searches turned up only two URLs (at several different locations), both of which were broken. Academic servers too. Even the link at JC's blog article doesn't work ;-)

Dominic

[HaroldW]

BBD --
You'll find much of the same material (as Polyak et al. 2010) in chapter 6 of the 2009 U.S. Climate Change Science Program report "Past Climate Variability and Change in the Arctic and at High Latitudes."

[BBD]

HaroldW

Thanks again. It's unfortunate that you weren't around a couple of days ago ;-)

[Shub]

BBD
I'll say this again (since you so freely use strong words like "nonsense" etc).

[1] There is no global climate for the Earth
[2] There may be a global temperature anomaly. It can be calculated.
[3] It is however, not clear what the global temperature anomaly means.
[4] Just to be clear, global climate is not equal to global temperature anomaly

I would request you to pause and think: 'hey, what is this guy saying?', 'can it make sense?' instead of just dismissing any concept without much consideration. I have found, for example, that I can understand a great many concepts in climate without resorting to a single 'global climate'.

[BBD]

Shub

I have given your various comments on this thread my full attention. My responses are set out above (eg May 14, 8:16pm).

Repeating your claims does not validate them. Perhaps it would be more helpful if you took your own advice:

I would request you to pause and think: 'hey, what is this guy saying?', 'can it make sense?' instead of just dismissing any concept without much consideration.

As far as I can tell, you haven't listened to a word I've said on this thread.

[BBD]

Shub

After all this nonsense, I want to say one more thing, because it is important.

You, and others like you, were the single most important factor in helping me understand the weakness of the 'sceptical' argument. The waffling, the illogicality, the repetition of incorrect statements, the sheer stubborn, blinkered resistance to any reasoned argument... the goalpost-shifting, the refusal to recognise and adhere to accepted norms in scientific reasoning...

It's more or less all here for posterity. Thank you for all your help.

[Shub]

Ok BBD, be off in your own world. Its Ok really.

All the problem starts, as I have said earlier, only if you assume I am trying to make some overall sense. I am not. That's how I think.

I asked two questions: Why dont the tropical land temperatures correlate well with the satellite? Why is the land record running a bit warm than the troposphere over it? You don't have any answers (your own opinions about this notwithstanding). Neither does anyone else (I've seen the literature myself). Let's leave it at that, and that's all I want to leave it at. Messy situations and loose ends don't bother me.

You neither have the patience nor the time to weigh another's words and consider what they mean. Instead you assume what they are saying, why they are saying it, and then answer to that. You have concluded: 'climate sensitivity is the only question left, whoever doesn't subscribe to this perspective is an idiot'. You have to live with your perspective.

I'll offer another thing for you, since you are so fond of this.

[1] There is no such thing called 'climate sensitivity'. 'Sensitivity' is conceptually, a tautological blackhole.
[2] At the least, it is not simply obvious that such a thing a climate sensitivity exists.

[BBD]

[1] There is no such thing called 'climate sensitivity'. 'Sensitivity' is conceptually, a tautological blackhole.

Rubbish.

See Knutti & Hegerl 2008. This is just embarrassing. You should stop now.

[BBD]

[2] At the least, it is not simply obvious that such a thing a climate sensitivity exists.

Also incorrect. The climate is sensitive to a different degree to different forcings. Ice albedo is clearly powerful enough to engender positive feedback and shift the global climate into and out of glacial maxima.

How that compares to the estimated climate sensitivity to CO2 is a matter of interest.

The usual misconception here is that there is a single value for 'climate sensitivity' and that it is '3C'. This is of course the hypothesised median value for equilibrium sensitivity to a doubling of CO2 over the notional pre-industrial level.

Just the usual muddle, eh Shub?

[BBD]

Ok BBD, be off in your own world. Its Ok really.

In the light of our exchange on this thread to date, this is unintentionally very funny.

[Maurizio Morabito]

If people studied the history of phlogiston alongside physics and chemistry there would be not be a single knowledgeable catastrophic AGWer around.

[BBD]

You neither have the patience nor the time to weigh another's words and consider what they mean.

Yes, I do, and you have consumed far more than your fair share of both. That's why I have stopped being indulgent with you.

Your statements above on this thread are designed to distract from, or undermine, the broad but incontrovertible finding that:

- GATA is warming at the surface and the TLT

- There is no known mechanism (aside from CO2 forcing) that can account for the accumulation of energy in the climate system that is causing GATA to increase

Your agnosticism is a pose to conceal a scepticism which you cannot back up with rational, referenced argument.

The irritating thing is that I suspect, in your heart of hearts, that you know this.

[BBD]

Maurizio Morabito

So phlogiston = known radiative physics WRT CO2?

Or is the problem the 'catastrophic' bit?

Or is it a sort of mash-up between the two?

Obviously I do not know if you have read the whole thread, but if you have, you will know that I am a lukewarmer - not a catastrophist.

[Maurizio Morabito]

Well, your comment about "climate sensitivity" sprung to mind all the convoluted ideas there were about phlogiston. Yes, once one believes in the existence of "climate forcings", then "sensitivity" might make sense. But there is nothing real about "climate forcings", just as heat is not a liquid. It's just a somewhat-useful model that suffers heavily from reification.

[BBD]

But there is nothing real about "climate forcings", just as heat is not a liquid.

So, SW radiation from the Sun is not a climate forcing? Fascinating. And what exactly is the connection between this statement and 'heat is not a liquid'.

Seems like a non-sequitur to me.

While you consider the non-existent forcing of the climate system by solar SW, you could also explain why the known radiative physics of GHGs such as CO2 does not retard the flow of energy from within the climate system out into space. And how this phenomenon is also not a climate forcing?

Then you'd best be off to collect your Nobel.

[Maurizio Morabito]

Thanks, I'll leave the Nobel to you and your future paper about "How to measure of all known climate forcings".

[Maurizio Morabito]

Oops..."How to measure all known climate forcings"...

[BBD]

oops, how to obfuscate instead of accepting one is entirely in the wrong...

[BBD]

You said there is no such thing as climate forcing. I asked you to explain where this left the sun.

I'm waiting...

[Maurizio Morabito]

please figure out was a "forcing" is and why most of what befalls under the category cannot be measured not even in theory.

the obfuscation is all yours. there is a definition for "climate forcing" so please don't redefine the words.

[BBD]

Maurizio

please figure out was a "forcing" is and why most of what befalls under the category cannot be measured not even in theory.

Since you clearly refuse to answer the question about the sun and CO2 as climate forcings I asked you at 1:08pm and 2:38pm above, I take it that you cannot.

So, let's move on.

Please provide references to support your statement quoted above.

I know that it is utter nonsense, but that's not at issue here. You said it, so you need to back it up with some hard evidence.

Go for it.

[BBD]

Oh, and I don't appreciate this sort of thing:

the obfuscation is all yours. there is a definition for "climate forcing" so please don't redefine the words.

You argue first that there is no such thing as climate forcings (12:39pm):

But there is nothing real about "climate forcings", just as heat is not a liquid.

Then you appear to admit that yes, they exist but are partially quantified (1:32pm):

Thanks, I'll leave the Nobel to you and your future paper about "How to measure of all known climate forcings".

Thus contradicting youself.

Now, I am "obfuscating" because:

there is a definition for "climate forcing" so please don't redefine the words.

This isn't rational discourse, it's poor quality rhetoric. Up your game.

[Maurizio Morabito]

You seem to have a peculiar recollection of near-past events. I have said "climate forcings" do not "exist", and that they are "somewhat useful" as long as they are not reified. Then you jump in talking about "SW radiation from the Sun". But that's not what I wrote about. I wrote about "climate forcings".

The old Galilean in me still thinks the general concept of "climate forcing" does not exist, i.e. "climate forcings" don't exist as such, because there's lots of "climate forcings" that cannot be measured, not today and not in a million years' time.

Please argue about that, if you want to argue with me.

[BBD]

Maurizio

Oh no. I've been subjected to this tactic too often recently and I'm not going to let it pass again.

You are either incapable of logical discourse, or you are being deliberately tricksy in order to appear to make a point when in fact you have nothing to say.

Recent events are visible to all above. You now look borderline dishonest.

To recap: climate forcings are real. To argue otherwise is obfuscation.

What is Solar SW radiation if not a climate forcing?

What is energetic re-radiation within the atmosphere by CO2 if not a climate forcing?

QED

Of course it's impossible to quantify all forcings to the nth degree of accuracy. And I do not claim that this has been done. Simply that sufficiently detailed approximations exist for scientifically valid investigation of the climate system and the effects of varying the forcings acting on it.

Some uncertainty does not mean that all such endeavour is worthless/fraud etc as you are clearly implying.

[Maurizio Morabito]

You do not know what you're talking about. It's not a matter of uncertainty. There is no way to measure a GHG's "climate forcing" for example. One can compute it, ie estimate it: but there is no way anybody will ever come up with any tool to measure it in the real world.

I repeat myself: it's a tool. It has to be used as such. It doesn't mean it exists, just like electrons don't orbit nuclei like planets, even if the concept of an "orbit" is useful. The fact that people defined "climate forcing" to include "solar radiation" doesn't mean that "solar radiation" is a "climate forcing". It only means it is included in the (human-invented) category of "climate forcing".

[BBD]

Maurizio

You do not know what you're talking about.

;-)

The fact that people defined "climate forcing" to include "solar radiation" doesn't mean that "solar radiation" is a "climate forcing". It only means it is included in the (human-invented) category of "climate forcing".

Okay. So tell me. What is solar radiation (incident on the Earth's atmosphere and surface, obviously) if it isn't a climate forcing?

And why, if it solar SW isn't a climate forcing, is the Earth not much, much colder than it is?

And if GHGs aren't climate forcings either, why does night time temperature not plummet to well below freezing? What components of the atmosphere prevent direct and rapid energy loss to space during the hours of darkness?

Or indeed generally? How do we explain the average global range of diurnal temperature variation without forcings?

I repeat: you are either incapable of logical discourse, or you are being deliberately tricksy in order to appear to make a point when in fact you have nothing to say.

You choose.

[BBD]

Another point:

I'm sure you are familiar with the term Milankovitch Cycle.

Long term changes in the Earth's orbital eccentricity, and in the Earth's rotational obliquity and precession alter the amount of solar SW radiation reaching the surface. This results in the onset and termination of glacial maxima (Ice Ages).

How can the sun be responsible for triggering and ending glacial maxima if it isn't a climate forcing?

I'm puzzled.

[Maurizio Morabito]

You have reified a concept, that is you have been led to believe that a physics abstraction called "climate forcing" is actually a real entity. It is not. And it is not, because it cannot be measure. It is just a category, useful in certain contexts. The Sun has influenced the Earth's climate without knowing what a "climate forcing" is.

It's like talking to an astrologer, I say "celestial bodies' influences according to one's birth chart don't exist" and he replies "so don't you believe the Moon causes tides?". And I answer, "I haven't said that, I have said that celestial bodies' influences do not exist". Of course if one believes in astrology, one can compute all those influences to one's satisfaction. It doesn't mean a thing about their existence.

[BBD]

You are attempting (and failing) to discredit a descriptive mechanism by which scientific investigation of the climate system is carried out.

Just because the Sun influences climate 'without knowing what a "climate forcing" is' does not invalidate the concept of (a) climate forcings per se and (b) solar forcing of climate.

This is paper-thin stuff and barely worth discussing, let alone arguing about.

Your repeated insistence that forcings cannot be measured is incorrect. They cannot be quantified to a high level of accuracy. This is absolutely not the same thing, and is where your logic breaks.

Now, are you still arguing that there is no such thing as climate forcings in general?

And solar forcing? (If so, you must answer the question about Milankovitch cycles above).

And GHG forcing? (If so you must answer the question about why the Earth is the temperature that it is, and why we do not freeze solid at night time).

This is how rational discourse works. Let's give it a go.

[Maurizio Morabito]

Who says anything about "discrediting"? I even made the example of the electron's orbit. Rational discourses work on the basis of people replying on the point one is stating, not distorting it beyond belief.

[BBD]

Rational discourses work on the basis of people replying on the point one is stating, not distorting it beyond belief.

See 3:12pm above and address 6:26pm directly.