Sunday
Sep252011
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill APS: AGW is controvertible
Sep 25, 2011 Climate: Sceptics This appears to be the surprising implication of a statement by the American Physical Society. Hot on the heels of the resignation of Nobel laureate Ivar Giaever from its membership, the society has issued a statement declaring that it has all been a terrible misunderstanding.
The APS says it that its climate change statement does not assert that "anthropogenic" (man-made) climate change is incontrovertible – but that the evidence of global warming is.
Reader Comments (54)
Phew that's a relief. Now if we can only get rid of the medieval warm period........
Quite a long time ago there was an ice age, now there isn't an ice age, I would say that it was pretty much an undeniable fact that there has been a certain amount of global warming since then. I still have doubts about the 'OMG we're all gonna die' consensus though.
I don't know that this makes them look any better. Especially when they then say things like:
"The graph of global temperature vs. time for the last 30 years shows just that."
Appeal To A Drawing to demonstrate that Global Warming is 'incontovertble'?"
Lord Have Mercy.
Andrew
From the article that Bish linked:
'In its policy statement, the APS declares: "Emissions of greenhouse gases from human activities are changing the atmosphere in ways that affect the Earth's climate. They are emitted from fossil fuel combustion and a range of industrial and agricultural processes. The evidence is incontrovertible: global warming is occurring. If no mitigating actions are taken, significant disruptions in the Earth's physical and ecological systems, social systems, security and human health are likely to occur. We must reduce emissions of greenhouse gases beginning now."'
I guess that a really good weasel would enjoy parsing this paragraph in a way that is compatible with:
"The APS says it that its climate change statement does not assert that "anthropogenic" (man-made) climate change is incontrovertible – but that the evidence of global warming is."
However, the first statement above is clearly a call to arms against manmade global warming for which there is incontrovertible evidence. No doubt Giaever will conclude that he is being played for a fool.
In its policy statement, the APS declares: "Emissions of greenhouse gases from human activities are changing the atmosphere in ways that affect the Earth's climate. They are emitted from fossil fuel combustion and a range of industrial and agricultural processes. The evidence is incontrovertible: global warming is occurring." (Climate Realists http://climaterealists.com/index.php?id=8395)
I read that as" humans are causing emissions, emissions are causing warming, warming is incontrovertible". Have I missed something?
It is obvious to all that the claim by APS that its original statement does not assert that "anthropogenic" (man-made) climate change is incontrovertible is disingenuous. We are clearly meant to infer an incontrovertible causal connection between the emissions of greenhouse gases, the global warming and significant disruption. Else why begin and end the paragraph talking about greenhouse gases if they independent observations?
If the third sentence is claimed to be more or less independent of the rest of the paragraph, try replacing it with something else e.g
Does this make any more sense?
Actually, I cannot bear to let a weasel get away with supporting the American Physical Society's statement, so let me make the matter crystal clear. In the APS statement:
'In its policy statement, the APS declares: "Emissions of greenhouse gases from human activities are changing the atmosphere in ways that affect the Earth's climate. They are emitted from fossil fuel combustion and a range of industrial and agricultural processes. The evidence is incontrovertible: global warming is occurring.'
The first two sentences are undeniably about manmade global warming. The third sentence states that the evidence is incontrovertible but can be read as being about global warming not AGW. However, if it is read in that way, it involves a change in topic and, for that reason, is a clear example of a Red Herring. The APS has no way to get this egg off their collective face. "Oh, what a tangled web we weave when we set out to deceive." My paraphrase.
Cognitive dissonance, Ho! It was predictable.
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We see by the actions of a major sicentific body, the American Physical Society, that they no longer have a common relationship with scientific virtues.
How many more of these increasingly frequent episodes with scientific groups ( like the IPCC, APS, UEA and many more) will there be before the self-claimed scientific self-correction mechanism is actually invoked by the processes of science?
John
This parrot is dead!
GW is real
AGW is virtual
CAGW is nonsense
Husband: But darling, you promised
Wife: No, i said not at the moment Dear.
Yup, we're winning ;-)
Is the APS is run by lawyers and not physicists?
"In a statement issued after Prof Lewis' departure, the APS said that "on the matter of global climate change, APS notes that virtually all reputable scientists agree... carbon dioxide is increasing in the atmosphere due to human activity"........and?
In a further statement, the APS notes that virtually all reputable scientists agree that most if not all human beings breath in oxgen and exhale carbon dioxide.
Wow, they must really be suffering an exodus of members. Desperation?
And these people are geniuses. That's scary.
Please pardon a simple moron, but I don't get the difference.
All they mean is that my Phil's been right all along. Told you.
Now that there are some "Nothing travels faster than the speed of light" contrarians out there do you think that:
1) The APS will issue a statement claiming "Nothing travels faster than light is incontrovertible".
2) The members of the APS would allow them to make such a statement even though they firmly believe that "nothing travels faster than light"
The APS is lying to CYA (ie, cover your arse). A real stink-bomb.
I think a few more resignations are needed.
ZT
And these people are geniuses. That's scary.
Sadly, we are not Vulcans with infinite logical rigor in our thinking like Spock had. Just because one excels in logical deduction and induction at times does not mean that we as humans do it all the time. A day or two ago I pointed out Newton had an interesting private life and Einstein ignored the mathematics of Lemaître's "Big Bang" theory even though it was a logical and mathematical extension of Einstein's own Theory of Relativity because of the theological implications. He even put Lemaître down with the comment:
"Vos calculs sont corrects, mais votre physique est abominable"
("Your math is correct, but your physics is abominable.")
Many years ago in a college course on western civilization, I remember the professor pointing out that old theories don't die, their advocates do. What he meant what that when some of us advocate a position on something, particularly in academia, they will stick to that position until they die. I really expect Mikey Mann or even Al Gore to declare with their last breath that they were right about AGW, the hockey stick or what ever.
The issue is not converting the advocates, but keeping new ones from developing. A couple more cold winters will see to that.
Getting back to my favorite Irish mailman weather forecaster, Michael Gallagher has apparently taken off from predicting the weather this year. However, locally in California, the squirrels have been chewing up every pine cone they can. They have been making a terrible mess all summer, something the old timers haven't seen since that last really bad winter we had about 20 years ago. We shall see.
I do have more faith in the squirrels than the weather bureau -- particularly the MET.
And yes, I do expect to see BCL, ZDB, and Sid all posting their undying beliefs for years to come. It is the nature of some people.
"And yes, I do expect to see BCL, ZDB, and Sid all posting their undying beliefs for years to come. It is the nature of some people."
As soon as the local AGW cell boss get the latest set of talking points together. hahahaha ;)
Andrew
Why have a statement about it in the first place? I've not visited their sites, but doubt they have statements about anything else, or that the word "incontravertible" appears in any Physics text book or paper anywhere on the planet.
Don Pablo, you forgot Hengist.
Don Pablo de la Sierra: "I remember the professor pointing out that old theories don't die, their advocates do."
Maintain your memory, Sir; and spread such insights abroad.
This is a beautiful example of the usefulness of the multi-defined terms "Climate Change" and "Global Warming', and why it's done that way.
Global Warming has been happening (recently, so to speak) since the Little Ice Age. Anthropogenic Global Warming, such as it is, has been happening in the last 50 years.
So, in the first part of the paragraph, they talk undeniably about AGW. Then, the assert that for one sentence, "Global Warming" really mean "natural global warming", which few would argue with. Then, in the next sentence, they're back talking about AGW.
This kind of thing can only happen two ways: deliberate intention to obfuscate, or actual stupidity.
I don't think they're stupid...but apparently, and sadly, it appears that they think we are.
From the comments on this story at the Torygraph:
"More and more scientists are speaking out and saying that global warming has been over-exaggerated. Me too.
Dr Paul Matthews
School of Mathematical Sciences
University of Nottingham"
Look for the pea under the thimble.
This is the biggest ever Marxist conspiracy except this time they've allied themselves with the big banks, particularly Goldman Sachs and Deutsche desperate to replace defunct mortgage based securities with carbon trading securities.
If they get away with trading the future earnings' stream from taxing the very stuff of life [food is involved because it is carbon-based], this will be the tyranny to end all tyrannies.
Are they so arrogant and smug that their spokesman is told to make out that we mere mortals outside the APS are all both illiterate and stupid?
It's hard to see from this article exactly what the APS is trying to say, even assuming that the fragmentary statements in the Telegraph are accurately reported. But they do seem to be pulling back to a more defensible position, which is a good thing.
The two statements they seem to be making strongly are (1) that global average temperatures have increased over the last thirty years (the period for which we have satellite data), and (2) that adding greenhouse gases to the atmosphere will have some effect on the climate. While I wouldn't use a word like "incontrovertible" for anything in science, these two statements seem almost certainly correct and utterly uncontroversial. The interesting questions then remain: (1) what (if anything) is causing the warming we have observed?, and (2) how strong is the effect (i.e., what is the climate sensitivity)? (There is also an interesting side question of what (if anything) we know about global temperatures before the satellite era, which I do not consider here.)
The idea that we have answers to those two questions with anything resembling physics-level certainty is what leaves many scientists feeling queasy about foolish statements by our supposed representatives. Climate science is still a very young discipline, and a little less certainty and a little more humility is needed at this stage.
Latimer
It may be in his job description, so no specific instructions would be required
The APS's "clarification" of its climate change statement is worthless. If it had intended to correct misunderstandings and introduce clarity, it would have released a replacement climate change statement in which was embodied the truth of what is and isn't known, giving some recognition of uncertainties (eg. gone would be the word "incontrovertible") and sufficiently explicit in its wording to avoid the false attributions presently in their statement.
This would basically amount to an almost 180 degree departure from the text of the current statement, though, and I suspect that unless the APS haemorrhages membership to the point that it can no longer afford to pay its staff, this is not going to happen.
I also don't understand why it has a statement or policy on this either. Presumably it doesn't have one on String Theory?
Don Pablo de la Sierra: "I remember the professor pointing out that old theories don't die, their advocates do."
Or as the old quotations has it, "Funeral by funeral, science advances".
The APS must be infested with a bunch of weasels!
Well, I've a bit of an anecdote. Arthur Smith, information manager, or librarian for the APS once went to the trouble of tracking my repetitive line 'We are cooling, folks; for how long even kim doesn't know.' back four years and posted it at lucia's, intending to ridicule me. It backfired a bit, what with proliferating cooling memes.
But, that's a shot from the fortress. Smells like desperation to me.
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@ Jonathan Jones
Regarding the statement that global average temperatures have increased over the last thirty years, your comment says that seems “almost certainly correct and utterly uncontroversial”. Yes, but so what?
If this year is warmer than last year (and we did not have data for any other years), would it matter? Obviously not, because it could easily be due to chance. If we had three years of increasing temperatures (and no data for other years), would it matter? Again, three years could easily be due to chance.
So do the past thirty years of temperature matter? No one has demonstrated so. Worse, the people involved do not seem to have understanding of statistical time series—which is what is required to answer the question. For a non-technical elaboration, see my article in the Wall Street Journal:
http://www.informath.org/media/a42.htm
That includes a link to technical details.
Jonathan Jones,
I find your assessment much more concise and credible than that of the APS.
So, if the situation can be more openly and simply captured as I think you have done, why isn’t a science body like the APS (any others) being concise and direct about the situation?
That is my eternal (well, 20+ years anyway) question.
John
@DougS
According to Wiki
Collective nouns for a group of weasels include boogle, gang, pack, sneak and confusion.
Take your pick!
Not sure why this is either surprising or newsworthy. The 'consensus' has ALWAYS been about 'the globe is warming', 'CO2 levels are increasing', 'humans are responsible for producing some CO2' and similar statements, mostly on a level with such tumultuous revelations as 'the sun rises in the east'.
As such, the 'consensus' has always also been ridiculously banal, but it allows the 'denier' label and disparagement when people question it - it is always 'You deny global warming!!!!!', cue outrage, huffing and puffing, rather than 'You deny anthropogenic global warming,' which is seldom claimed.
The whole circus is built on rhetoric, clever definitions, and carefully worded statements such as the 'consensus' above. It has very little to do with science or facts, much more so with sophomoric debating tactics and obfuscation.
Does that mean I can be found innocent of murder if the evidence that I committed the crime is "incontrovertible"?
It is really dumb and disingenuous of the APS to take this stance. Read the whole statement in context:
"Emissions of greenhouse gases from human activities are changing the atmosphere in ways that affect the Earth's climate. Greenhouse gases include carbon dioxide as well as methane, nitrous oxide and other gases. They are emitted from fossil fuel combustion and a range of industrial and agricultural processes.
The evidence is incontrovertible: Global warming is occurring.
If no mitigating actions are taken, significant disruptions in the Earth’s physical and ecological systems, social systems, security and human health are likely to occur. We must reduce emissions of greenhouse gases beginning now.
Because the complexity of the climate makes accurate prediction difficult, the APS urges an enhanced effort to understand the effects of human activity on the Earth’s climate, and to provide the technological options for meeting the climate challenge in the near and longer terms. The APS also urges governments, universities, national laboratories and its membership to support policies and actions that will reduce the emission of greenhouse gases."
It is obvious IN THE CONTEXT OF THE WHOLE that the second paragraph does indeed intend to assert that humans are causing global warming. Anyone who can't see that the second paragraph means IN CONTEXT that there is anthropogenic attribution of global warming either has very poor comprehension skills, or is being deliberately obtuse.
But don't just take my word for it: the APS have given a commentary on their policy, adopted by their Council on April 18, 2010, which, inter alia, states:
"The evidence for global temperature rise over the last century is compelling. However the word "incontrovertible" in the first sentence of the second paragraph of the 2007 APS statement is rarely used in science because by its very nature science questions prevailing ideas.
...without mitigating actions significant disruptions in the Earth's physical and ecological systems...are likely. Such predicted disruptions are based on direct measurements (e.g., ocean acidification, rising sea levels, etc.), on the study of past climate change phenomena, and on climate models...Even with the uncertainties in the models, it is increasingly difficult to rule out that non-negligible increases in global temperature are a consequence of rising anthropogenic CO2."
So, they admit that 'incontrovertible' was a very silly word to use, especially by a scientific body, but they are not going to change it because this statement is for the scientifically illiterate. Note however that they use the word 'incontrovertible' as a synonym for 'compelling' in a statement directed to policy makers. But the commentary gives the lie to the latest APS stance, for it clearly says, as a commentary on its own statement, that there can be little doubt that "non-negligible increases in global temperature are a consequence of rising anthropogenic CO2". So, not only are the global temperature rises 'incontrovertible', but the anthropogenic attribution of them is practically a dead certainty as well - we might say very 'compelling'. In other words, 'incontrovertible' in APS-speak for the less scientifically literate.
Orwellian is the official language of AGW. It's the tangled web woven to deceive. In the end, the AGW itself will be trapped in the web.
@Don Pablo, 3.20am: "Many years ago in a college course on western civilization, I remember the professor pointing out that old theories don't die, their advocates do. What he meant what that when some of us advocate a position on something, particularly in academia, they will stick to that position until they die."
Too right, Don. This is much the conclusion that Thomas Kuhn came to in his 1962 book 'Structure of Scientific Revolutions'. On p 151 of the 3rd edition (1996) Kuhn quotes from Charles Darwin:
"Although I am fully convinced of the truth of the views given in this volume...., I by no means expect to convince experienced naturalists whose minds are stocked with a multitude of facts all viewed, during a long course of years, from a point of view directly opposite to mine...But I look with confidence to the future, - to young and rising naturalists, who will be able to view both sides of the question with impartiality."
and from Max Planck:
"...a new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it."
If Darwin, Planck and Kuhn were right, we can, as Don Pablo suggests, expect "...Mikey Mann or even Al Gore to declare with their last breath that they were right about AGW, the hockey stick or what ever."
Climate science sceptics and critics need to be prepared for a long struggle.
The original APS statement:
..would be fine with what they are now saying so long as it didn't continue with:
So only global warming is incontrovertible, but we must take steps to mitigate a natural process or significant disruptions to all we hold dear are likely. We must reduce emissions, but we're only saying that the world is warming, not that we're the cause.
I would say that the APS is now apparently learning that they backed the wrong horse, and are trying to save face as they back down from their absurd statements. This is having the unfortunate effect of making them look like greater fools in the short term as their statements are contradictory.
What direct factual evidence is there that human activity has had or is having any detectable impact on global climate? The Scientific Method requires that any such hypothesis must be supported by direct fact-based evidence if it is to gain credibility. With the continuing absence of such evidence, the AGW hypothetical remains mere conjecture. That no such evidence exists is established by analogy to Sherlock Holmes’ “the dog that didn’t bark” proof. If such evidence existed, the alarmist community along with their supporters in the main-stream media would be shouting (barking) it from every podium.
Incidentally, some observers hypothesize a 60 year climate cycle, most recently comprised of the 30 year cooling period of 1940-1970, during which alarmists (Stephen Schneider, et. al.) were touting the perils of global cooling, and the subsequent 30 year warming period of 1970-2000, during which alarmists (Stephen Schneider, et. al.) were touting the perils of global warming. The thirteen-year global temperature record since 1998 reveals a discernible cooling trend which may indicate the onset of another 30 year period of global cooling – only time will tell since we have no laboratory other than the planet to work with.
@Douglas J. Keenan , I have very carefully avoided implying that the observed rise is significant: note my reference to "what (if anything) is causing the warming". I prefer as far as possible to draw a fairly sharp line between data and interpretation.
I did, of course, read your article when it first came out, and I have no quarrel with it.
Still trying to 'hide the decline', I see...