Bishop Hill Niceness at home and abroad
Dec 2, 2014 Blogs Climate: other Shub Niggurath is bemoaning the lack of venues in which there can be conversations across the lines of the climate debate.
Good discussions used to take place, on occasion, at WUWT or BH. There were brief periods when the old Collide-a-scape blog and Bart Verheggen’s site provided such moments. They are hard to come by now. Maybe the consensus and conspiracy poison spread mindlessly and artlessly throughout the blogs by certain people is to blame.
He's right of course. I have struggled long and hard to make BH the venue where that can happen, but it seems that a visit from, say Richard or Tamsin is guaranteed to get some people riled, with the result that moderation becomes a full-time occupation. I can't afford to spend that amount of time on it.
Still, it's interesting to see that from some people's perspective, the limited exchanges here at BH are something to aspire to. As Judy Curry explains in her retrospective post on climategate, the state of the climate debate, and in particular the recent furore over Tim Ball's posting at WUWT and the riposte by Richard and Tamsin.
...the 1100 comments at WUWT were absolutely vitriolic against Betts and Edwards. On twitter, the vitriolic comments were coming from the warm side, i.e. how stupid they were to post at WUWT...Well, it seems Betts and Edwards are trying to promote civility, something that the UK does pretty well. Presumably they thought that posting at WUWT would be like posting at BishopHill. NOT. Climate change and social media is mostly blood sport over in the US (and Australia and Canada), where the situation remains very polarized and polarizing.
So I guess things could be worse. But please, everyone, do try to keep the temperature down when a comment thread features someone you disagree with. Even if they refuse to admit they are wrong or refuse to engage with your arguments or misquote you. If you start a shouting match, few people will hang around to see how right you are.
Reader Comments (422)
The scale of the disaster was historic. In New York City, the water had not come this high since at least 1821, if then.
Capell
There is a vineyard at Holmfirth in West Yorkshire now. Growing vines in Yorkshire does not need the elevated temperatures you imply. I see no reason why your postulated MWP was any warmer than present conditions.
What? Do you want me to be more certain than I am? If I was you'd be going "how can you be so certain, what about uncertainties and caveats?", if I add all the appropriate caveats and uncertainties you go "see, he's not certain about anything". An apparent win-win, for you, I guess.
On the Millikan thing from Martin A.
Well no. That's bullshit.
As life would have it, Eli took Sr. Physics Lab many years ago from the guy, who as a young assistant professor figured out that something was wrong with the Millikan value, J. A. Bearden, and believe Eli, Bearden was anything but shy about it.
Bearden was able to get a more accurate value of e using X-Ray spectroscopy, and this set off a "conversation" between him and Millikan, which eventually came down to Bearden figuring out that Millikan's student had measured the viscosity of air incorrectly. This is basic to the oil drop experiment because what is measured is the movement of the drops through air.
According to Bearden what the student had done was to take the average of previous measures and when his value exactly matched the average he wrote it up and graduated. Unfortunately for Millikan, there was a subtle experimental bias in the apparatus that was used (everyone agreed that the method was a large improvement on other instruments for measuring the viscosity).
Anyone doing the oil drop experiment and using the Millikan value for viscosity would get the Millikan value for the charge on the electron.
"An apparent win-win, for you, I guess."
I think it is more of a lose-lose for you.
From the Guardian, following Climategate. The ultimate Malthusian James Lovelock's excoriating view of the lying, dumb, little rascals who do modern climate science. The tone is one of betrayal and disappointment.He realises the game of de-industrialisation through phony science is up . A dog wouldn't believe these idiots.
on CRU scientists
I was utterly disgusted. My second thought was that it was inevitable. It was bound to happen. Science, not so very long ago, pre-1960s, was largely vocational. Back when I was young, I didn't want to do anything else other than be a scientist.
They're not like that nowadays. They don't give a damn. They go to these massive, mass-produced universities and churn them out. They say: "Science is a good career. You can get a job for life doing government work." That's no way to do science.
I have seen this happen before, of course. We should have been warned by the CFC/ozone affair because the corruption of science in that was so bad that something like 80% of the measurements being made during that time were either faked, or incompetently done
on computer models
I remember when the Americans sent up a satellite to measure ozone and it started saying that a hole was developing over the South Pole. But the damn fool scientists were so mad on the models that they said the satellite must have a fault. We tend to now get carried away by our giant computer models. But they're not complete models.
They're based more or less entirely on geophysics. They don't take into account the climate of the oceans to any great extent, or the responses of the living stuff on the planet. So I don't see how they can accurately predict the climate.
on predicting temperatures
If you look back on climate history it sometimes took anything up to 1,000 years before a change in one of the variables kicked in and had an effect. And during those 1,000 years the temperature could have gone in the other direction to what you thought it should have done. What right have the scientists with their models to say that in 2100 the temperature will have risen by 5C?
The great climate science centres around the world are more than well aware how weak their science is. If you talk to them privately they're scared stiff of the fact that they don't really know what the clouds and the aerosols are doing. They could be absolutely running the show.
We haven't got the physics worked out yet. One of the chiefs once said to me that he agreed that they should include the biology in their models, but he said they hadn't got the physics right yet and it would be five years before they do. So why on earth are the politicians spending a fortune of our money when we can least afford it on doing things to prevent events 50 years from now? They've employed scientists to tell them what they want to hear.
on scientists
Sometimes their view might be quite right, but it might also be pure propaganda. This is wrong. They should ask the scientists, but the problem is scientists won't speak. If we had some really good scientists it wouldn't be a problem, but we've got so many dumbos who just can't say anything, or who are afraid to say anything. They're not free agents.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2010/mar/29/james-lovelock?
Darlow
"it would be quite sufficient for there to be demonstrations of coincident, localised warm periods"
No it would not. If you are talking about global warming you have to show that the globe was warmer - not just a few cherry-picked regions."
Yes, it would. By the same token, the proxies studies of Mann, Marcott, et allia, are also localised.
Entropy Man
Which started in 2009. So are you now conceding that the MWP was as warm as it has been since 2009?
Slowly, slowly we are getting there.
True. But the only information that they will provide is whether or not the assumptions and conclusions made for their construction were correct. Once you have made your model, you then have to compare its results with observations of reality. Sadly, for the climate, this takes time – an awful lot of time; decades, perhaps centuries. We have no idea of all the subtleties and nuances that could exist within the system, nor all the variables that could influence them. All we can do is gather the data, try to use it to create models, then see if the models replicate observations – if not, then the models are wrong (and, on the basis of the meagre time and information that is available at present, this should be considered a reasonable conclusion – or even an expected conclusion), and more assumptions have to be made with the data gathered.Yes, and if they're not wrong, or - as Gavin Schmidt might say - if they are skillfull, what then?
"Yes, and if they're not wrong, or - as Gavin Schmidt might say - if they are skillfull, what then?"
How would one respond to the same question if posed by an astrologer?
Capell
Turn it around. We are now as warm as the Mediaeval Warm Period.
'Yes, and if they're not wrong, or - as Gavin Schmidt might say - if they are skillfull, what then?'
Gavin Schmidt is a man who strikes me as having roughly the same integrity as the average drug baron, so I am prepared to take the risk. Thanks.
How do you think I should respond to someone who appears to have suggested that climate modelling is analogous to astrology? I'll assume that you think that astrology is complete nonsense and based on no physical laws whatsoever, but that isn't completely obvious.
"I'll assume that you think that astrology is complete nonsense and based on no physical laws whatsoever, but that isn't completely obvious."
Do you think Aries women should avoid the bathroom until the astrological model is proven?
http://www.deccanchronicle.com/141204/nation-crime/article/astrologer-predicts-how-women-could-be-sexually-abused-based-zodiac
not banned,
Maybe you misunderstand me. I wasn't suggesting that astrology might not be complete nonsense, I was suggesting that it's not obvious that you realise that it's complete nonsense.
Whatever your view of astrology, my question stands as a means to explore your position:
//
"Yes, and if they're not wrong, or - as Gavin Schmidt might say - if they are skillfull, what then?"
How would one respond to the same question if posed by an astrologer?
//
Do you have a response?
not banned,
How do you think I'd respond to an astrologer claiming they could tell me something of the future? Come on, you can't expect people to answer ridiculous questions.
So you don't have a response? If you don't, perhaps you could consider how a man of science would advise Aries women with regard to using the bathroom in the face of such authoritative predictions?
not banned,
No, I don't have an answer. Do you have a question worth answering (or, maybe more correctly, a relevant question worth answering)?
EWC track forecasts for Sandy were accurate. Such a storm had never been seen in the numerical weather forecasting era and figuring out the track was not part of the model assumptions which are physics based as ATTP says. Weather forecasts today on the best machines show skill 7 days or more forward at small scales.
Well no. That's bullshit.
Dec 4, 2014 at 10:01 PM Eli Rabett
Richard Feynman. Well known bullshitter, especially on matters to do with physics.
Well I consider the question I posed relevant and worth answering but you have chosen to "pass" and request another.
So try this one:
Do you think a person receiving a personalised response to this examination paper would be in the possession of "more information" and, if so, how would you advise them to act on it?:
http://astrology.org.uk/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/Website-Certificate-Interp-Exam-Aug-12.pdf
Information on the examining faculty and its credentials can be found here:
http://www.astrology.org.uk/
Outrage at the affront to astrology?
"f you are talking about global warming you have to show that the globe was warmer - not just a few cherry-picked regions."
so says Lord Noel Darlow. He is comical. He does not seem to reaiise how those hockey sticks were manipulated into the "right" shape. Has Mann ever said that his first attempt was a pile of shite? Will the scientivists ever question the actions of Peter Gleick?
Of course they won't. They are content to act like criminals.
Not banned yet: you seem to have aTTP on the ropes, and he either cannot see that, or is in denial about it. How apposite! Come on, aTTP, it is a perfectly reasonable question; break the habits of a lifetime, and answer the question!
@Capell
"the proxies studies of Mann, Marcott, et allia, are also localised"
Have you read the papers in question? Do you have the competence to judge their content?
@diogenes
"He does not seem to reaiise how those hockey sticks were manipulated into the "right" shape"
Why do you presume to criticise work which you have never actually read and which would in any case lie outside any of your competences?
Serious question. These climate discussions are absolutely fascinating psychology: so many angry people so stubbornly determined they are right but who know virtually nothing about the subject except for a narrow range of memes parroted from various denier blogs - sometimes stale memes which mostly were abandoned long ago.
If you want to talk about climate science, you are obliged not to make claims which are not supported by the set of published papers which have not yet been refuted. That is all that scientific knowledge is, no more and no less.
"If you want to talk about climate science, you are obliged not to make claims which are not supported by the set of published papers which have not yet been refuted. That is all that scientific knowledge is, no more and no less."
Noel - do you have a model for predicting which papers will be appearing here?:
http://retractionwatch.com/
I'd like to manage my thinking time more in line with my obligations.
Radical,
I've answered stacks of questions but I note this is a rather normal strategy...ask lots of questions and when you finally ask something ridiculous that the other person doesn't answer go "see, he never answers questions". Tell you what, why don't you break the habit of a lifetime and explain to me why asking me a question about astrology is somehow relevant. I'm rather failing to see it as it just seems a bit moronic to me, but feel free to convince me otherwise.
Your avoidance makes it relevant. Good night.
Noel Darlow
Perhaps you would like to explain to us that 'hiding the decline' is good science. I'm sure you are a lot cleverer than James Lovelock or Jonathon Jones who wrote
'People have asked why mainstream scientists are keeping silent on these issues. As a scientist who has largely kept silent, at least in public, I have more sympathy for silence than most people here. It’s not for the obvious reason, that speaking out leads to immediate attacks, not just from Gavin and friends, but also from some of the more excitable commentators here.
Far more importantly most scientists are reluctant to speak out on topics which are not their field. We tend to trust our colleagues, perhaps unreasonably so, and are also well aware that most scientific questions are considerably more complex than outsiders think, and that it is entirely possible that we have missed some subtle but critical point.
However, “hide the decline” is an entirely different matter. This is not a complicated technical matter on which reasonable people can disagree: it is a straightforward and blatant breach of the fundamental principles of honesty and self-criticism that lie at the heart of all true science. The significance of the divergence problem is immediately obvious, and seeking to hide it is quite simply wrong. The recent public statements by supposed leaders of UK science, declaring that hiding the decline is standard scientific practice are on a par with declarations that black is white and up is down. I don’t know who they think they are speaking for, but they certainly aren’t speaking for me.
I have watched Judy Curry with considerable interest since she first went public on her doubts about some aspects of climate science, an area where she is far more qualified than I am to have an opinion. Her latest post has clearly kicked up a remarkable furore, but she was right to make it.
The decision to hide the decline, and the dogged refusal to admit that this was an error, has endangered the credibility of the whole of climate science. If the rot is not stopped then the credibility of the whole of science will eventually come into question.
Judy’s decision to try tocall a halt to this mess before it’s too late is brave and good. So please cut her some slack; she has more than enough problems to deal with at the moment.
If you’re wondering who I am, then you can find me at the Physics Department at Oxford University. Feb 23, 2011 at 10:29 PM | Jonathan Jones '
I want you to explain the science to us. You will have read the papers yourself.
@not banned yet
Did you have some kind of point to make?
Noel - try thinking about it and see if you can get anywhere with it.
@Jonathan Jones
I'm not sure what you think was hidden - please do explain - but the divergence problem has been widely discussed in the literature and elsewhere. Hiding something in plain sight is an odd sort of concealment strategy.
Numerical weather forecasting does not depend on observations but on physics. The assumptions are physics assumptions, stuff like conservation of energy.
@not banned yet
Sorry you'll have to explain what you mean. Do papers get retracted? Yes. Also refuted. Science is a process not a fixed point in time. If you cannot change you could not learn.
However, at any given moment the sum of what we know about a scientific subject is defined by the set of papers which have not yet been refuted. It is possible for multiple schools of thought to exist, temporarily, until we can either identify which are wrong or discover something deeper which unites them.
The important point though is that no ideas may be proposed without a formal, technical argument to back them up. The rules are the same for everyone.
I find this whole discussion on the notion of being or not being civil beside the point. By habit I natuarally tend to be civil and will continue to be so. When I say being civill or not is beside the point I do this because the point is one of right or wrong. Either CAGW is right or it is wrong and the bulk of the evidence (The hiatus/pause etc) is undoubtedly that it is wrong. Unless and until believers/warmists are prepared to entertain the possibility that CAGW is indeed wrong being civil wont change a thing.
The hard truth is that CAGW was implausible from the very begining and none of the alarmists seem to come withn a million miles of asking a very simple and sensible question such as: From the point of the biological well beingh of our Earth what would be the optimum CO2 concentration? Patrick Moore suggests that it might well be 1,500 p.p.m.
Unfortunately no amount of civility/courtesy seems capable of persuading warmists to think about this kind of thing.They persist -- come hell come high water -- in thinking of CO2 as some kind of control knob (Judith Curry's phrase) that can turn the Earth's warmth up or down.
Noel Darlow
Phil Jones wrote the phrase "hide the decline" in the context below. Jones is a very clever little chap, not unlike yourself. I thought you could explain the science behind it.
"On November 16, 1999, Phil Jones, the Director of the CRU,[143] [144] sent an email containing the following statement to the three coauthors of the hockey stick graph (and cc'd two of the authors of the chapter about proxies in the 2007 IPCC report):[145] [146] [147]
I've just completed Mike's Nature trick of adding in the real temps to each series for the last 20 years (ie from 1981 onwards) and from 1961 for Keith's to hide the decline.[148]"
http://www.justfacts.com/globalwarming.hidethedecline.asp
@Ted Swart
Like a great many other people you have failed to observe the golden rule for scientific discussions: the limits of what one can reasonably claim about matters of science are defined by the set of published papers which have not yet been refuted.
If you don't have competence (ie you are not actively engaged in research in a relevant field), you cannot simply make sweeping statements such as the pause shows "CAGW is wrong". That is, scientifically, an idiotic thing to say as has already been mentioned in this thread. Short-term variability tells us nothing whatsoever about the long-term trend. We know that the former can easily swamp the latter even although (by definition) it will eventually average out to zero.
@E. Smiff
What is there to explain? Tree ring proxies from high latitudes don't seem to work from the 60's on. So they used something else instead.
It's exactly as simple as that.
The problem has been discussed quite openly in the literature and elsewhere, including IPCC reports.
"Climategate" said very little about the scientists whose emails were stolen, but an awful lot about the people who tried to make an issue of it - some of whom still do, to this day.
Dec 3, 2014 at 8:39 PM | Unregistered Commenter Noel Darlow patted himself on the back for having lifted a paragraph from a carefully crafted Press Release (which he calls "evidence"):
There may (or may not) be a reason that Noel Darlow chose not to provide a source for that which he deems to be "Pretty clear [evidence]".
But, for the record, the original source of Darlow's quote was actually an 18 July 2012 Press Release, issued by Norfolk's finest which can be found at:
Police closes UEA investigation - along with other documentation resulting from their "investigations".
The amusing thing about this Press Release, btw, is the repetition of the phrase, "sophisticated and carefully orchestrated attack on the CRU’s data files, carried out remotely via the internet". It fooled no less a personnage than the NYT's Andrew Revkin, so I guess it's not surprising that Darlow should have glommed onto it as well, rather than digging a little deeper than a mere Press Release.
Had he done a little digging, Darlow would have learned (as I did, and as I had pointed out to Revkin) that, in fact, the picture is somewhat more subtle and complex than that found in this mere Press Release:
Perhaps Darlow also missed Leo Hickman’s July 20, 2012 interview with “Detective chief superintendent Julian Gregory, the senior investigating officer” from which he would have learned:
Just goes to show that a little digging into the available evidence can yield a somewhat different picture than a quote from a mere Press Release. But, last time I checked, Revkin hadn't updated his post.
Now, of course, the great mystery is whether or not Darlow will continue to stick to his superficial guns ... and continue to rely on a few paragraphs from a mere Press Release - for which he didn't even offer a source, in the mistaken belief that he's provided "evidence"!
Careful what you say Noel Darlow.
I happen to have a B.Sc in chemical engineering a D.Sc in Physical Cemistry and a Ph.D in maths/computer science. In additon I set up the firstt radiocarbin dating laboratory in Africa -- way back in the 1960s. We radiocarbn daing fundis knew all about the extra CO2 long before most scientists and we used tree rings for dating purposes and calibration -- not as dicey temperature proxies.
You are free, if you so wish, to write off 18+ years of no warming (or 26 years if you use satellite temperatures) . measurements) as not qualifying as scientific evidence that there is something awry about CAGW. 18-26 years is not a case of "short term" evidence. And what about all the other predictions by warmists that have proved to be
erroneous. Hurricane/tornado frequncoes and intensities have fallen not risen.
Al Gore has no competence in science yet he makes what you call "sweeping statements" about the dangers of global warming all the time.
You cannoit measure the evidence by the size of the set of pro-CAGW published paperss in climate science that do support CAGW. You cannot be so ignorant that youj do now know tha tthe CAGW believers have done everything in thie rpwer to hinder the publication of sceptical papers.
Surveys have shown that some 50% of metereologists are sceptics and in excess of 70% of geologists are sceptics. They cannot be simply written off as not having a relevant scientific background.
Maybe I could just ask you: How do you decide what would be an optimum CO2 level in the atmosphere? .
.
Dec 5, 2014 at 6:43 AM | Ted Swart
Ted has 'pwned' Darlow .... LOL, mooi so, booitjie !!
Dec 5, 2014 at 6:42 AM Hilary Ostrov
Hilary - I know that Norfolk Plod interviewed various people - Steve McIntyre for example - about their views on climate change. That was a pretty clear indication they were floundering without a clue (literally without a clue).
Who was it, who might well have had an idea who FOIA was, but N. Plod said "We did not ask him because he probably would not have told us"? [I'm sure it will come back to me]
Streetcreed
Sorry, Darlow 'pwned' himself when he wrote
'What is there to explain? Tree ring proxies from high latitudes don't seem to work from the 60's on. So they used something else instead.'
I've a good mind to phone the police and tell them I have uncovered 'FOIA'. He's still alive and working undercover in the denialsphere. We should have known.
I think I can tell whether or not a temperature proxy can or cannot be applied globally. And I think I and many others had the nous to realise that when presented with a proxy paper that largely explored evidence from northern climes, and reported no MWP whatsoever (Mann 98/99) that perhaps that paper was at the very least questionnable rather than neo-science.
It seems your biased mind is unperturbed by such minor difficulties, which is of little matter, save that you arrive here and assume we'll be entertained by your idiocy.
Typical troll tactics, when you are losing, move on to something else. No response to my earlier comment, so here we go again.
I repeat, nothing was "stolen" when those emails appeared in the public domain. Nobody was deprived of any real property.
In the witch-hunt that followed, Rog Tallbloke was deprived of real property, for months, by the allegedly neutral Norfolk Plod. In the end, they were forced to admit that there was not a skerrick of evidence to justify it. The only person who was deprived of his property was Roger.
Alice Through the Looking-Glass, once again.
"What is there to explain? Tree ring proxies from high latitudes don't seem to work from the 60's [sic] on. So they used something else instead."
Well that throws a new light on proxy verification that we hadn't considered before!
I have a new theory that when a tree's latitude exceeds the 20th century year they no longer grow at the same rate as before. And we know this is a global law because the evidence for this is worldwide, and people like Jones, Briffa and Mann have proved it.
Priceless! Perhaps Darlow's brain hasn't worked in the 21st century, so we should just consider something else.
@Hilary Ostrov
In fact I did give the source: the Norfolk police.
The rest of your comments are a fantastic example of the kind of motivated reasoning which first attracted Lewandowsky to the world of climate science denial. As you yourself have said, they found no evidence of a leak but they did find evidence of an external attack. You can't just believe things are true because you want them to be true.
I note the double standards at play here: I can only imagine what you would have to say if the evidence presented by the IPCC for AGW was "we don't have any evidence for anthropogenic forcings but we can't rule them out".