Saturday
Mar282015
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill In which a BBC presenter reveals what balance means
Mar 28, 2015 BBC Climate: Mann Hat tip to Barry Woods for pointing me to this Twitter exchange, in which the BBC's Helen Czerski reveals what the corporation understands "balance" to mean in the context of the climate debate:
@SellaTheChemist @theresphysics @MichaelEMann @4589roger @guynewey And actually, it's v. balanced in sense that there is no "skeptic" voice.
— Helen Czerski (@helenczerski) March 26, 2015
Reader Comments (120)
@ATTP: Climate Alchemists have completed the almost impossible task of getting ALL basic GHG IR and heat transfer physics wrong, then claim those who apply the real physics to complex industrial processes, which can only work if the physics is right, are 'deniers', a new untermenschen. Such arrogance is facing a commensurately big fall as this new Lysenkoism collapses. The dynamics are simple; the astute get out first leaving the zealots to collect the real flak.
The exodus started 3 years go.
"Science" is all about scepticism and scepticism: is the life blood of the only means of furthering science.
Whereas, resorting to outright fabrication, then making admissions to the effect of "the science is settled" is not only obtuse in the extreme, it can only mean one thing, political advocacy and advocacy begets liars.
NCC,
I keep getting told that people with your views don't exist or, if they do, are such outliers that it's not representative of anything. And yet, here you are, saying the kind of things that would normally get you labelled in a manner that you may not like, and completely unchallenged by others who regularly comment here. Maybe they just can't be bothered (with which I sympathise) but a little effort may help to illustrate that your views are a minority view, not accepted by most who associate with this site, nor with the host of the site.
I just caught a few minutes of The Big Question on BBC2 and saw a handsome young chap. Pity it was a shouting match with more heat than light.
@ATTP: hot rolled steel, ~0.95 emissivity, has to be ~100 deg C before radiative energy loss rate exceeds natural convection in coupled heat transfer. For aluminium, it's ~300 deg C. I have measured these parameters experimentally. The coupled heat transfer coefficients are in standard handbooks.
Climate Alchemy claims Earth's surface Emittance, aka Exitance, aka Radiosity, what you get from the S-B equation by putting in temperature, is a real rather than a potential energy flux in a vacuum to a sink at Absolute Zero. WRONG
Real radiative energy flux is the vector sum of Irradiances at a plane just outside the surface. Experimentally, for the Earth it's mean 63 W/m^2 = (396 W/m^2 Irradiance from the surface - 333 W/m^2 Irradiance from the atmosphere). To claim that what a pyrgeometer outputs is a real energy flow is a pitiful failure to understand how the instrument works.
NCC,
So what? You do realise that the temperature profile in the lower troposphere is set by convection? I have a feeling that you're confusing toy models that people use to explain the greenhouse effect, with the actual greenhouse effect.
Ken/aTTP
"If a large number of people who understand the theory better than you do regard this weakness as being irrelevant or as having minimal impact, maybe you should consider that your doubt is unfounded."
A good point but actually if the doubt is due to lack of characterisation in data methods and logical assumptions then no amount of theoretical gymnastics can hide the issue. It doesn't matter how well you think you know the theory. If you can't measure it to the accuracy that you state and you haven't been clear at all times about this (as in you're hiding behind a statistical model rather than doing rigorous testing in conjunction with reasonable assumptions) then you are being economical with the truth.
Unfortunately it's a trait I see in a lot of theorists and modellers, which is not that serious a bias unless you're influencing billions of pounds and possibly changing the course of an economy. Then it's naive, arrogant and amateurish.
"Of course. However, if a large number of people who understand the theory better than you do regard this weakness as being irrelevant or as having minimal impact, maybe you should consider that your doubt is unfounded?"
The same people who've given us numerous models which are diverging wildly from reality and from each other. Perhaps it is your belief that any of you better 'understand the theory' that is unfounded.
ATTP:
Whether many critics or skeptics fully understand the detail of the physics is neither here nor there.
Any lay person can understand very easily that if model predictions do not match reality in the form of actual observations and can see that when the actual temperature is bumping along at the lower bound of the 95% CI of the models, despite significant rises in atmospheric CO2 over the same period, the models must be significantly in error and are not to be trusted for decisions costing humanity billions and possibly causing direct harm to peoples lives.
The emperor has no clothes. Rational people can see it.
In the great real world experiment following Hansens infamous prediction and testimony from 1988, his model was emphatically wrong as are pretty much all of the current climate model predictions. If they can't predict shit then we have to conclude the models are bollocks. NO-ONE predicted the pause of 18 years and if you read the APS transcript you will see that the climate modellers were (and probably still are) clueless on the cause of the pause.
That is the reason why the pseudo-scientists who call themselves "Climate Scientists" are being exposed.
When the economic models failed to predict the recent crash the question was asked "Why did no-one see it coming?"
When the climate models failed to predict the recent pause the question was asked "How can we stop people noticing?"
This fear of the truth is justified on religious grounds - because the pseudo-scientists have faith in their doomcasting and thus scientific inquiry must be censored as heresy. A good example of this anti-Enlightenment attitude can be see above, Mar 29, 2015 at 9:57 AM:
Doubt is never unfounded in science. But it is the opposite of faith. Climate "science" is actually a religion. A false religion.
This error applies equally to Climatology, UFOology and homeopathy. But not to science.
NCC, are you saying that satellite operators are incorrectly interpreting the instrument readings on the satellites measuring outbound flux? That would be worth a paper. I have an idea that they are under-modelling the amount of direct reflection, a.k.a. gleam, of impinging sunlight, in that such direct reflection is enhanced at low Sun angles to the Earth's surface, whereas satellites generally measure at high angles.
Of course. However, if a large number of people who understand the theory better than you do regard this weakness as being irrelevant or as having minimal impact, maybe you should consider that your doubt is unfounded?
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And there, in a nutshell, is everything that is wrong with large sections of climate "science."
When the models fail, predictions fail, alleged "inputs" are proved to be simply wrong (e.g. upside down Tijlander), statistical methods are proved to be absurd, data is cherry-picked and fudged, etc, this is one of the standard responses.
Begone, peasants. Your betters understand the "theory", and your trivial concerns are of no import.
And they wonder why their credibility as scientists is down there with the credibility of politicians who say they will fix absolutely everything if we will only vote for them.
temperature is set by convection:
Is that why in a windstill saharah it is 40degrees at noon and minus 5 at midnight?
Because of differences in convection
Hmmmm
From the twitter thread. A lot of us sceptics would just like to see the evidence. Just show us the data you have collected, observations you have made and experiments you have performed to show the 'strong evidence' that CO2 was warmed the Earth loads. To me looking at the full paleoclimate record is a good start to see if it fits in with what we know about the Earth's climate history. I don't think the AGW theory fits that data at all
Helen Czerski
@ helenczerski
8h
@Gregory__Adams @tan123 @dangainor @ClimateDepot I'm happy to talk
about evidence.
@ATTP: in 1977 Houghton showed, Fig. 2.5 of 'Physics of Atmospheres', that of the two possible modes of energy transfer to the lower atmosphere, mostly radiative required substantial temperature drop surface to local atmosphere, whereas with convection controlled Lapse Rate, there is no mean temperature drop. Therefore, the Enhanced GHE claimed by the IPCC cannot take place; if it did, a simple calculation shows the mean temperature of the ~20 m 'Surface Air' would be near 0 deg C, colder than at any time in the past 444 million years.
A decade ago, Hansen admitted NASA had set out to measure this temperature drop, but couldn't, so model it: http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/abs_temp.html . That is when I suspect they set out on their course of deception. Furthermore, the ATTP post in which he announces that convection controls heat transfer in the lower atmosphere implicitly accepts there can be no Enhanced GHE; time for him to stop his self-nullifying propaganda methinks....:o)
ATTP: "Of course. However, if a large number of people who understand the theory better than you do regard this weakness as being irrelevant or as having minimal impact, maybe you should consider that your doubt is unfounded?"
I suspect many who follow BH belong to the same category as me. A scientific background (physics in my case), high IQ, a reasonably successful professional career (science/technology/law-based) and formerly a believer until, on retirement, I started to look more closely at climate science and its implications. If people like me are doubters, then the likes of ATTP should be considering how well founded their science is.
As someone older and dare I say it, wiser, than ATTP, I can see BS when I see it and I have seen plenty of BS (and worse) in climate science. What's more the conduct of many of those who are prominent in climate science (and some scientists, e.g. Nurse, and scientific institutions, e.g. the RS, outside climate science) is beyond belief. Then you get people like Czerski (the female Brian Cox wannabe) who are actively seeking to shut down debate because they know full well just how easy their position can be dismantled through proper debate with sceptics/"sceptics"/deniers or however else they choose to label people who question the credibility of climate science as it currently stands. As to Lewandowsky, Cook and their like, they are beneath contempt and I am amazed that genuine scientists such as Dr Betts and Dr Edwards are not actively disassociating themselves from these blatant propagandists.
By the way, Ken Rice, you come across to me as being in the same camp as Lewandowsky et al.
attp's obfuscation, threats and twisted rationales...
Told?
You haunt several skeptic sites and we are to believe that you accept what someone tells you? Obfuscation!
Labeled? Why!?
A not so subtle threat?
When and why is any world of discussion does one side take to "labeling" their opponents with offensive terms?
Not in science or politics; normal discussions avoid offensively labeling anyone. Only in the world of insidious environmental activism is it a tactic to aggressively label dissenters with opprobrium. Activist climate science, lacking solid evidence, assaults opponents with disgraceful terms instead of engaging in debate.
attypoo, there are many thousands, if not millions, of people who don't challenge CAGW dissenters. These same citizens are also waiting for full disclosure and honest science. Until they do, CAGW worries are rock bottom of the worry list.
CAGW is falsified! The models are wrong and badly used. The climate is not getting hotter. Deserts are not expanding. Animals, fish and birds are not going extinct. Rain is still falling normally. There is still snow and ice in winter, not forgetting that Antarctica and the Arctic have plenty of ice.
As Kim and NCC point out above, CO2 sensitivity is certainly not anywhere near alarmist claimed middle to upper boundaries.
Worst of all, increased CO2 means we can be thankful for increased crop yields and a milder climate
@AtheoK: when I first posted real radiative, IR and aerosol optical physics in the Guardian, to counter the IPCC's provably incorrect claims, the Trotskyites who then controlled Komment Macht Frei spent a lot of time trying to prove I was a member of the NF, when I support no Political Party. They then banned me for life.
The ATTP character seems to be a third generation acolyte of the same false science. I always offer a hand of friendship to such people to try to teach them correct physics (I have taught at a Russell Group University; my terminology is rather ancient, but works). However, this new bunch of acolytes seems impervious to re-education out of extreme arrogance brought on presumably by being fêted by politicians bearing limitless funds for the propaganda that keeps their owners rich.
It looks like the only tactic that can bear fruit with such unintelligent obduracy is to apply the correct science with a metaphorical lump hammer regularly applied to the cranium, assuming that is where the brain resides.
ATTP appears to be conspicuous by his absence re these later comments, whilst still posting on other threads.
Cat got your tongue?
Whats most interesting about people like ATTP and even those with a science background is...they are capable of wasting their time posting on sites..but are "just too busy" to read or correct the evisceration of CAGW papers on Climate Audit...
Thats why us "sceptics" are puzzled by the proponents of CAGW...
"We" see this as vindication in our beliefs, which is that the majority of the faithful are clearly out of their depth with the science.
That you are prepared to see such trash published year in and year out...and yet remain silent...is just intellectual cowardice but hey..whatever floats your boat. :)