Saturday
Apr142012
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill The OK coral
Apr 14, 2012 Climate: WG2 Matt Ridley reports on a new paper in Current Biology, which finds that natural variations in pH along the Great Barrier Reef are larger than anything likely under global warming:
The good news from the research, says Professor Hughes, is that complete reef wipeouts appear unlikely due to temperature and pH alone.
"However, in many parts of the world, coral reefs are also threatened by much more local impacts, especially by pollution and over-fishing. We need to address all of the threats, including climate change, to give coral reefs a fighting chance for the future."
Reader Comments (162)
William Morris, have you ever propagated 'stony' corals ?
Well most academic researchers are absolutely horrible at it ... talking to one just the other day, they are far better at killing stony corals for research and have limited knowledge on what it takes to keep them alive.
As a successful propagator of stony corals let me assure you that stony coral does just fine in 7.6 - 8.3 pH range that is quite common amongst marine aquarists. Daily swings of pH in a captive environment of 0.3 is quite common and of no detrimental effect to the coral.
So, what's the argument again ?
The most amusing part of the "acidity is increasing faster than ever before" argument is the comparison of the rate of pH decline with those experiments testing resiliance of sea creatures to changes in pH. Typically, these experiments double or more the CO2 in a matter of days or less and then look at the effect on shell formation etc. That's more extreme than anything increases in CO2 will do in nature, and yet mass extinction does not take place. Indeed, sometimes it doesn't have any effect at all. Given the slow decrease in pH and decades to adapt (rather than hours) to these incremental changes, I doubt the ocean wildlife will even notice.
According to alGore the CO2 we are spewing into the air will stay there for thousands of years. Yet somehow it is diving into the oceans and turning them acid already! How can it be in two places at the same time?
The predominant reactive material in solutions with pH >7 are hydroxyl ions (OH-). Focussing only on the H+ concentration gives a completely misleading picture of the chemistry.
At pH 8 they outnumber the hydrogen ions by 100 to 1. It is possible that with increased CO2 concentration this ratio may eventually come down to somewhere nearer 50 to 1. But they will still remain as the overwhelming majority. The seawater solution will still be alkaline, not acidic. Just a bit less so.
Ref : O and A level Chemistry. This is not 'hard' stuff.
Anyone else have a problem with the use of the word acidification. Taking an alkali solution (the sea) and bringing it to nearer Ph7 isn't what i call acidification.
Ocean Neutralization just doesn't sound as scary though... In 300 years time our oceans may be entirely neutral...
You lot really don't know what you are talking about, old Bill Morris has a Degree in Wikipedia so I think you should all bow to his superior knowledge and towering intellect.
@al
'Anyone else have a problem with the use of the word acidification. Taking an alkali solution (the sea) and bringing it to nearer Ph7 isn't what i call acidification'
Exactly. The term 'acidification' is purely used as it conjures up bad ideas in the minds of laymen. Everybody knows that acids are 'bad'. But 'neutral' things are harmless and inoffensive.
The cynical and incorrect use of the a-word merely reflects the alarmists own recognition that their case is very very weak. (almost as weak as carbonic acid) and that to gain any attention (and continued grant money) they have to spice it up.
'We have to announce disasters or nobody will listen' Houghton.
Roger Tolson:" You lot really don't know what you are talking about, old Bill Morris has a Degree in Wikipedia..." Once in a while I am reminded of what a plodder I am, you've just done it. I just wish I'd have thought of that! Priceless!
I too have a problem with the word "acifidication" it's part of the scare language intended to amplify the problems they're making up into being "catastrophic". There doesn't seem to be any depths to which they won't sink in trying to find the problems, while their "science" gives new depths to the meaning of the word "shallow".
Still annivegmin and Old Bill (BA Wikipedia) (h/t Roger Tolson) are really convinced that humans will destroy the planet, but just can't prove it. Like I was told I'd go to Hell if I ate meat on a Friday, but nobody could prove it, but they still believed it anyway.
This series of comments on 'making the sea a tiny bit more neutral' is illustrating some aspects of the intellectual corruption that has facilitated the AGW scare. This is where science is valued 'not according to some ground in truth, but by the extent to which it promoted social change for the good'. Those who agitate about the oceans becoming acid are doing so because they think it will help.
Science-as-activism came into the natural sciences through geography and the other environmental sciences. At the time universities were using funding incentives to promote such things as ‘community partnering’, ‘knowledge transfer’ and science-for-policy – and all this against an idea of the old paradigm of the academy as an ivory tower full of irrelevant boffins wasting public money pursuing science for science’s sake. The distinction between science and policy, and between science and political interest became blurred. In this atmosphere, the involvement of advocacy groups (WWF, Greenpeace etc) in the scientific process was condoned and encouraged. The work of Mike Hulme, the founding director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, exemplifies the corruption of conventional natural science practices by this new activist approach to science (more here)
The italicised quotes are from this invaluable essay by Bernie Lewin: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/12/27/climate-change-and-the-corruption-of-science-where-did-it-all-go-wrong/
Let's use an analogy to show how dishonest the word "acidification" is:
When my ice cubes are taken out the freezer at -18C, they do instantly start melting. They may "warm up" or become "less cold", but they do not start melting until the surface reaches 0C.
"acid" and "alkaline" are specifically defined at a threshold pH level, just like melting.
And as for the, frankly, ridiculous "30% H+ concentration change" argument, let's put it in a perspective that you might understand. Sound is also experienced on a logarithmic scale. Apparently, a subway train at 200' has a sound pressure level of 95dB. A handdrill has a SPL of 98dB. You won't be able to tell the difference, they'll both be effing loud. However, the sound pressure of the handrill is 100% greater than that of the subway train. DOUBLE! OMG, it's really significant. Which it isn't.
Also: a quiet library is 30dB, a normal conversation at 3' is about 60dB. You will perceive this as twice as loud, but the sound pressure is 2^10 times greater - i.e. 1024 times greater. (every 3 dB is a doubling of sound pressure).
With all this arm waving going on in this post I am suprised this blog is not flying at 5000ft.
At then end of last nights CH4 program on the Atlantic someone said.
'We know humans are affecting the Atlantic but not how, but whatever the effect is it will be catastrophic.'
Belief before facts is activism.
Fred said:
Let's use an analogy to show how dishonest the word "acidification" is:
When my ice cubes are taken out the freezer at -18C, they do instantly start melting. They may "warm up" or become "less cold", but they do not start melting until the surface reaches 0C.
"acid" and "alkaline" are specifically defined at a threshold pH level, just like melting.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks Fred. This is the kind of useful example that helps to explain to people not trained in science just how dishonest and misleading the language is.
The other example I like to use, when people talk about 'acidification' as though it means that everything is heading towards dissolution, is that of using caustic soda (NaOH), i.e. drain cleaner, as bath salts. Hey, it's not acid, right, so no problemo? Less acid is good, yeah?
It is a lot easier to top yourself by swallowing Drano than vinegar - my final shot when people refuse to get the point.
Unfortunately it seems to be necessary nowadays to return to standard texts written before social science and environmentalism overwhelmed traditional ecological research, to get a balanced view of ecosystems without demonising CO2. A good one of that kind summarising the modern reef-building corals is here
http://www.geology.iupui.edu/academics/CLASSES/G130/reefs/ME_20.htm#Figure 20-1
The main requirements are tropical ocean temperatures, strong light penetration requiring clear shallow high energy water free from turbid mud, and full marine salinity. CO2 is important in assisting photosynthesis and calcification by means of a complex symbiosis with zooxanthellae within the coral polyps.
"At then end of last nights CH4 program on the Atlantic someone said.
'We know humans are affecting the Atlantic but not how, but whatever the effect is it will be catastrophic.'"
Breath of fresh air, don't you know CH4 is far more dangerous tham mere CO2?
Translation: "We're trying to gradually pull out of the temps/C02 mantra because it ain't working and we wanna keep our jobs". So from now on get used to a new term: "Environmental change".
Rogelio
you've got about right, along with sustainability.
Someone said 'the more you know, the more you realise you don't know" and I am so damn ignorant :-)
(cue cries of "you got that right mate").
All I do is question arguments that seem wrong or unjustified. Often there is no answer, which I take to indicate that I was right. Unlike many posters, I don't claim to know much about AGW etc. Where I quote information, I give a reference (e.g. Wikipedia :-) to make the source clear. BHers LIKE references - they always demand them if not given.
BTW, what is SkS - I'm told I belong there.
Bill, have you ever heard of William Connolley?
SkS is a non-sceptical web site run be a chap called John Cook. The website itself publishes pro-AGW literature and allows robust (but seldom ad hom) arguments around the "science".
"So", you think to yourself, "this is just the site for me, where I can learn about climate science and see the arguments tested in robust debate."
Unfortunately John C has a habit of removing sceptical arguments, and indeed changing the comments from sceptics to make his, or his visitors, arguments look sound and the sceptics dumb. Nice chap, but slightly over the top in his support for the Great Modern Mass Hysteria event we're watching unfold before us.
Wikipedia isn't regarded by anyone as a good source of information about climate science, and I mean anyone, sceptic and hysteric alike, because of Mr. Connolley's interventions. That's why your degree in it doesn't hold wait here. That's not to say what you've quoted isn't true, just that Wikepedia has been contaminated by hysterics changing things they don't like being said.
So now we have 2pack of ¨Bill¨ in Wikipedia.
William, to deal with your point that you've asked questions no one has answered. The issue here is pretty straightforward, the hysterics are arguing that the sea is acidifiying, it isn't it's getting less alkaline. I am assuming that when you pointed to the Wikipedia sources they were papers produced telling us that coral death would be widespread in the near future.
In fact the paper is supposed to have said the the levels of acidity (which there is none) are unprecedented in 300M years. Quite how they did this I don't know, but 300M years ago, at the end of the Carboniferous Period, the CO2 in the atmosphere was around today's levels and the temperature was around 12C, during the Mesozoic, 250 - 75M years BP the CO2 levels rose to around 2000ppm falling over the period to around 500ppm. Now here's the question: Why do they believe the low CO2 ( caused because of the rapid growth of trees and plants during the Carboniferous period) around 300M years BP caused acidification of the oceans by the level around 400ppm when levels four or five times higher, during the Mesozoic, at around 250 years BP didn't?
I don't have references for you because this is stuff from text books, i.e. agreed by all.
Hi geronimo, thanks for the comments. So is there a site, other than Wikipedia, that is considered by all sides to be autoritative?
I didn't raise any points about historic acidity or CO2 levels. I was interested in assertions from mdgnn that the CO2 would be absorbed by coccoliths producing chalk and some strange "CO3 pathway in phytoplankton". I wondered what sort of rate such processes work at and whether anyone knows what CO3 pathways might be (my guess is he meant carbonate ions but, not being a chemist, how should I know?). Then I got distracted by the semantics of acidifying versus neutralising - which I consider a red herring, but seems to agitate many people.
Hi WM: the carbonate pathway in some phytoplankton is well known. 20 years ago, when I was working on an international project funded by NEDO aimed at CCS from existing fossil fuelled power stations, I suggested it as a possible way to sequester CO2 in the ocean deeps to the east of Japan. These are depleted in nutrients so accelerate this metabolic pathway.
An alternative was to use the shallow bays in the Sea of Japan to grow biomass and increase the H/C ratio by solar energy. the Japanese decided to sequester the CO2 in polycarbonate building materials via chemical engineering.
http://www.whsmith.co.uk/CatalogAndSearch/ProductDetails.aspx?productID=33430515
This could prove very usefull now that Climate Change means that there will be no more snow frost or generally cold nights
Hi mdgnn: You know I love your interventions here, but complicated as things are, if you know your topic you can usually bring it down to something that's understandable at the first level. ( I don't know who said it but someone once said that if you have a scientific theory you should be able to explain it to a barmaid. Or me.
Now I'm really interested in the theory that coccoliths etc. but is there any simpler way you can explain it to us.
Tx.
Hi Jamspid:
Have you accidentally put your post on this thread? It doesn't seem to have the remotest connection with this thread, or indeed, this site.
Geronimo: there is a paper showing coccolith exoskeleton mass has risen by ~40% since the start of the industrial age:it's described here: http://planetearth.nerc.ac.uk/features/story.aspx?id=265&cookieConsent=A
Jamspid - so cute ;-)
But releasing polar bears into the wild?! That would sort out those pesky new penguins /sarc
"So is there a site, other than Wikipedia, that is considered by all sides to be autoritative?"
I don't know of a site that is considered to be authoritive by both sides, and Wikipedia has been thoroughly tainted by the depredations of William Connolley.
mdgnn: Thanks for the paper, but I wanted a mickey mouse explanation of how coccoliths absorbed CO2 and turned into chalk, then CO3.
Hi mdgnn, I guess you must have simplified it for us but I still don't understand. Phytoplankton like sunlight (talk has been of seeding ocean surface waters recently to encourage them to absorb CO2) and as such seem unsuited to making use of the oceans depths depleted of nutrients that you describe. Did I misunderstand?
Thanks for the planetearth link :-)
Seeding by Fe causes phytoplankton blooms to grow very rapidly: it's the crucial nutrient which is why you see blooms when old ice [lots of occluded dust] melts. You see it at the edge of icebergs, also recently in the Arctic. The CO2 idea comes from ~30% of the dead cells sinking to the ocean depths.
Another factor though is that dead phytoplankton also emits dimethyl sulphide which produces the fine particles of ammonium sulphate called Cloud Condensation Nuclei. The smell of the sea is DMS and the haze at high summer, high UV, is the aerosols.
But a very interesting part of the science is that you get these blooms at the end of ice ages.and in the melt part of the Arctic cycle when the old ice melts. The CCN stop cloud droplets coarsening so decrease cloud albedo. That means up to 30% increase in transmitted energy, accelerating local warming of the ice, also regional climate change which 18,000 years' ago restarted the deep ocean currents triggering the end of the ice age. The 1990's Northern warming was the same process now reversing as shown by the fall of N. Atlantic OHC: http://bobtisdale.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/figure-102.png
More recent data show continued massive cooling. i believe that much if nor most recent warming claimed to have been CO2-AGW was from this natural process. The warmists hate me for this.
Apr 15, 2012 at 3:16 PM William Morris
"BTW, what is SkS - I'm told I belong there."
Skeptical Science is a website http://www.skepticalscience.com/ It specialises in debunking anti-climate science. "Explaining climate change science & rebutting global warming misinformation".
Unfortunately, when you read what it says in detail, it often turns out that they are addressing "strawmen" - ie they mis-state the skeptical view in a way that makes little or no sense and they then proceed to explain how the mis-stated view makes little or no sense. When they do this, it makes me feel convinced that they don't really have any answer to the genuine skeptical viewpoint on a subject and would have done much better to have said nothing.
An example is what they have to say about CO2 atmospheric lifetime, which convinces me that they are totally confused about the physics of the topic, mixing up what goes on with a system in dynamic equilibrium with what happens when the equilibrium of such a system is disturbed by an external perturbation.
I have not read your postings but I would take be told you belong there as not really being a compliment.
WM
I don't know about the others here, but I find your faux-naive "I am but a child in these matters" schtick a tad irritating.
It's perfectly obvious to anyone who follows these discussions that you're a run-of -the-mill, dyed-in-the-wool warmist troll.
The way you insert yourself into topics, try and create opposition without offering any sound references and then duck & weave and evade the issue when cornered are classic give-aways.
Carry on entertaining us by all means - but don't kid yourself that the little red riding hood act is fooling anybody.
I believe the pH model "projections" [chuckle] about as much as I believe the temperature model "projections", and we probably don't have enough carbon to burn to make it happen anyway.
Meanwhile, seawater is still supersaturated with carbonate wrt to calcium, my blood plasma is more acidic than sea water, and pure water is more acidic still. And I've read plenty of comment from people who grow corals who say they don't believe it either.
mdgnn: (thanks for some serious conversation :-) "The CCN stop cloud droplets coarsening so decrease cloud albedo." Can you explain? I understood that CCN cause water vapour to start condensing (hence their name) and hence increase albedo, so why should they stop cloud droplets coarsening and decrease albedo?
Martin A: "I have not read your postings but I would take be told you belong there [SkS] as not really being a compliment."
And there's me thinking someone was concerned for my welfare!
Foxgoose: Though you wont believe me, it is true that I have never indulged in such newsgroups before the last 2 weeks or so. I do have views on the issues that don't match yours (collectively), but I am more pragmatic than you might suppose.
"The way you insert yourself into topics, try and create opposition without offering any sound references and then duck & weave and evade the issue when cornered are classic give-aways."
Ouch!
"insert myself into..." how else does it work - wait for an invitation?
"create opposition..." is that what asking questions is called now?
"without offering any sound references" - have I offered unsound ones? Which exactly?
"duck and weave and evade when cornered" - I'm not that flexible in my old age (inserting myself into things gets difficult too); but can you elaborate? I don't remember doing any of that.
William Morris, I am pretty sure no one deserves to 'belong to SkS'. A very low blow.
I do apreciate that BH, Watts Up With That, Climate Etc and a fair few others, are sites that allow genuine argument, albeit fairly robust, as you have already found here.
The best policy is to try and be as intellectually honest as you possibly can. Anything else is trolling and is pounced on mercilessly.
William Morris ... this site has a good index of papers relevant to these discussions.
http://www.co2science.org/index.php
WM: above ice, clouds form easily. Extra CCN reduce the width of the size distribution frequency so lowers coarsening kinetics. This restricts the generation of a second optical effect.that causes considerable albedo increase.
This is the second optical eff3ct which Sagan missed and means the 2nd AIE is the real (A)GW.
As the originator of the SkS reference, I want to clarify that I never said that WM 'deserves' to be there. No-one, no matter how evil, deserves that! I did, however, suggest that he and anivegmin (who seems to have disappeared back under his/her bridge) might find it 'more their scene'.
The faux wide-eyed naivete of WM, who keeps derailing the discussion and interspersing ignorance with expertise, tends to support my initial impression.
Johanna: "The faux wide-eyed naivete of WM, who keeps derailing the discussion and interspersing ignorance with expertise"
Two faux in one page - must be a record (oops that makes it three ;-)
You are taking yourselves too seriously. Much of the discussion that you say I have been derailing has been wordplay with 'acidification'. This general scientific term has been used since before BH existed. It has been discussed here many times (Google gives 57 page hits) and yet only in this thread have people come to realise that neutralisation is more apt (courtesy of me, Apr 14, 2012 at 3:45 PM and 9:02 PM). Some discussions! [actually the honour goes to James P Nov 5, 2010 at 11:52 AM, but not used since]. I guess links to fluffy polar bears are more On Topic.
ps. thanks for the reprieve (from SkS)
William Morris,
"You are taking yourselves too seriously."
That's definitely not true. We make sure we take the time out to play with the kids. See here and here.
@William Morris, now that we have a better grasp on where you are "coming from", in addition to the web locations already mentioned this site might provide a useful ensemble of climate information for you. In particular, it has a section dedicated to "ocean acidification".
http://www.co2science.org/index.php
I will regard a blogger as having a bare minimum of expertise of the blogger can answer both
1. What results from the difference in activity and concentration in the measurement of pH?
2. Why are the deep ocean waters so cold, when they are sandwiched between heat sources; and why is their pH so much closer to neutral that surface waters?
Please think hard before providing a Wiki type answer and then don't use Wikipedia. Derive from first principles.
@william morris
'yet only in this thread have people come to realise that neutralisation is more apt (courtesy of me, Apr 14, 2012 at 3:45 PM and 9:02 PM).'
Good to see that you agree that 'acidification' is only used to scare the horses and that 'neutralisation' is the correct term.
But your claim to be the first to notice this in the blogosphere is unsupported by the historical record. It has been one of my bugbears for years, and there were plenty who trod that path of righteousness before me.
Yes - curious how WM and anivegmin turned up around the same time with so many stylistic & linguistic traits in common.
I noticed, in both of them:-
1. "Professional" writing style. Fluid, precise & confident without any of the clumsiness that tends to afflict those of who weren't wordsmiths for a living.
2. As you say - a strong element of "role playing". Veering from wide-eyed innocence like "is there an authorititive source other than Wikipedia" - to scathing sarcasm when cornered.
3. Also on technical stuff, oscillating between "I'm new to this, please help me understand" - to elaborately referenced standard consensus memes.
4. Attempts to "control" the discussion by mopping up a number of other poster's comments in a list under headings.
Experienced sock puppetry or bought & paid for PR intervention? - You choose.
(Not mutually exclusive of course)
I wonder if Bish looked at his/their IP's.
To be fair to William, I think we're a bit prone to calling 'troll' when newcomers arrive - understandably when reviewing past contributions from people like Zed and Hengist! I suspect that self-deprecation on WM's part is being interpreted as naivety. A real troll would be a lot more snarky, IMO.
StreetCred: the site looks like hard work, not entertainment, but thanks for the link :-)
Latimer Alder: I wasn't claiming a blogosphere 'first'; that would be silly. But unless my naive google search misled me, BH doesn't use the term neutralisation. Thinking about it more I imagine a flask of alkaline under a titration pipette (beloved of posters here) containing an acid. With the pipette turned on, the acid will gradually (with some stirring) 'neutralise' the base. With no outside interference it will then go on to 'acidify' the flask. So the pipette, a simple piece of glass, is capable of two quite different actions (different according to the type-3 zealots here) without outside interference - and we think we are clever!
Foxgoose: that sounds almost like admiration and I take it as a complement. Thanks :-) BTW Bish wouldn't waste his time with IP checks; I'm sure he knows about proxies.
James P: you are a gentlemen sir. Thank you :-)
Silly me!
For a moment I forgot you were a professional troll.
"BTW Bish wouldn't waste his time with IP checks; I'm sure he knows about proxies."
So I take this is a confession?
Apologies for "lurking under my bridge" but I've been away.
Foxgoose,
Sorry I'm not a professional wordsmith but I'm flattered by your compliments, although a little concerned for you regarding the conspiracy theories. I'm actually a land/building surveyor (topographical/measured) from the North of England with no relation whatsoever (as far as I am aware) to William Morris, be he Victorian designer or citer of Wikipedia.
As far as comments such as - "Go away" "ignorant lazy arse" "Haven't you got something better to do other than embarrass yourself?" "You are still embarassing" "Embarassing and at times dishonest" "our new trolls" "If either would behave more like adults than adolescents they might be worth a few minutes of my time." (spelling mistakes included) are concerned; well I'll take those as the thinly veiled compliments I'm sure they were intended as.
Mike,
Yes a slip of the brain/keyboard - I meant "defer" not "demure".
I wont comment on the ridiculous semantic discussions regarding the word "acidification". Oh I just did.
Re. "Attempts to "control" the discussion by mopping up a number of other poster's comments in a list under headings." What am I supposed to do? There is some repetition and I'm heavily outnumbered. There now follows a list under headings -
Re. various comments about measuring the pH of the oceans -
Detecting anthropogenic carbon dioxide uptake and ocean acidification in the North Atlantic Ocean. Bates et al 2012 - www.biogeosciences-discuss.net/9/989/.../bgd-9-989-2012-print.pdf
From section 2.9 Trend analysis and statistics -
4.3 The signal of ocean acidification in the North Atlantic Ocean -
Re. various comments about small changes in pH -
A couple of asides - Human arterial blood has a range of 0.1 pH. Anything outside the 7.35-7.45 pH range and you're in trouble (Acidosis/Alkalosis). As any gardener will tell you the pH level of soil can have a significant effect and generally plants have quite a narrow preference of around 0.5 pH with different species preferring different levels.
Anyone familiar with the Cochrane Collaboration will be aware of the power of meta-analyses -
Hendriks et al 2010 - http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S027277140900537X A paper much liked by co2science but later disputed by -
Dupont et al 2010 - www.ips.gu.se/digitalAssets/.../1319543_dupont_et_al_ecss_2010.pdf
who in turn are reinforced by -
Kroeker et al 2010 - http://www.imedea.uib-csic.es/master/cambioglobal/Modulo_3_02/meta-analysis%20acidification/Kroeker%20meta-analysis%202010.pdf
Re. volcanoes belching out sulfer -
Yes there will be a localised higher level of acidity and a resulting reduction in local marine biodiversity.
Re. link to CO2science -
Why co2science might not be the best place to go - http://itsnotnova.wordpress.com/2011/10/05/nova-on-acid/
List of papers that just so happen not to be in the co2science database - http://itsnotnova.wordpress.com/papers-not-found-in-co2sciences-ocean-acidification-database/
Jeff Norman,
Sorry I didn't see your response on the Singer thread before. I've just posted another dishonest response.
WARNING! Contains some references to Mann and one reference to SkepticalScience.
Apologies to anyone/anything I missed, there have been a lot of posts since I was last here.
In the generally excellent discussion following this WUWT post (http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/12/27/climate-change-and-the-corruption-of-science-where-did-it-all-go-wrong/) - a must-read imho by the way - there is this marvellous riposte to a suspected troll who wasn't quite up to scratch:
'Sorry, and this really isn’t your fault, but we have requested a quality Alarmist troll from AlarmtrollsRus© for weeks now; one who is at least somewhat schooled in the usual Alarmist drivel, yet able to hold their own, not just fling ad hominems and use Arguments from authority and/or Consensus arguments. Please return to their headquarters and have them send someone with the qualifications we have requested. Thanks.'
Due to Bruce Cobb on December 27, 2010 at 4:50 pm at above link.