Britain and the environment

The occupy movement is the leading edge of progressivism yet Occupywallstreet's list of demands does NOT include climate change crisis. Why? Because of Kyoto's bank-funded "carbon trading stock markets" ruled by politicians and or politicians taxing the air we breathe. Obama has not mentioned the "crisis" in his last two state of the union addresses. Move on folks.
The good news is that the crisis was an exaggeration, proven by the fact that millions of people in the global scientific community choose not to act like it’s a real crisis. That would be one big protest if the world of science got of its throne. It was a consultant's wet dream. Move on.

I have a nagging feeling that Meme Mine is not human. Always copy-paste standard rubbish.

"You'll need to be more specific over when you want the temperature to be measured from and over what trend length."

Talk about trying to wriggle out. I gave you all those specifics.

"Hansen's 1984 prediction for the temperature anomaly in 2011 was 1C. Actual value from his own institute (GISS), 0.52C."

You really swallow all this denialist bogus hook, line and sinker, do you? The 1C was for scenario A, which assumed exponentially increased CO2 emissions. And yes, Hansen overestimated climate sensitivity, but not by much. For more, see http://www.skepticalscience.com/A-detailed-look-at-Hansens-1988-projecti.... And we are speaking 1984 - you don't judge computers by their 1984 standards, why should you do so for climate model?

"I believe the climate to be too complex for mankind to understand and it's naturally variable."

Of course it is naturally variable and not 100% understood, but that does not mean some basic effects of CO2 are very well known to be superimposed on this natural variability.

Anyway, +0.52C since 1984 should give pause for thought.

So you want to take up a bet that you don't wish to specify the exact parameters for, and you accuse me of trying to wriggle out of it.

I would stop reading the nonsense in skepticalscience.com ,which is a political website designed to help the warmist disciples who are incapable of doing their own research spam nonsense, and go to the original source, which is on the website of the institute that Hansen works for.

http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/1988/1988_Hansen_etal.pdf

His 1984 climate model predictions are shown as figure 3 in his 1988 paper. Scenario A predicts ~1.15C for 2011, Scenario B predicts just under 1C and scenario C predicts 0.6C. Actual observed temperature from his own institute 0.52C. This isn't a 1 off, his predictions have been getting ludicrously out for years.

http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v3/Fig.A2.txt

Hansen is a joke

CsezFcpBcs, best learn to read first. You wrote: "You'll need to be more specific over when you want the temperature to be measured from and over what trend length."

This was in reaction to my posting that said: "Let's define 'a few years' as 3 years, and see whether on 5 February 2015 the trend since 2005 is up or down. To avoid having to choose a particular dataset we can use the WoodForTrees Temperature Index (WTI)"

Answers all your questions. So if you believe Hansen is not credible, why do you try to wriggle out from under a clear bet?

Hansen's prediction is based on the 11-year solar cycle and the current La Nina conditions. The solar cycle was in a cool phase over the last years, and La Nina directed warmth into the deep oceans. That is why the surface temperatures are flat over the past few years. But once the solar cycle enters its warm phase and La Nina stops, we'll see rapid warming. And that is because all of this is superimposed on the longterm warming trend due to CO2.

But I'm sure your 'news' sources will tell you it's all due to solar cycle and La Nina ending, say 'natural causes' and ignore the long-term trend, so whatever happens you never have to admit you're wrong.

You seem to misunderstand the skeptic point of view. I believe that the climate is too complex to predict, so why would I take up a bet that requires me to make a prediction?

Hansen has made a short term prediction. Why, when his fellow warmists say it's impossible

https://abstracts.congrex.com/scripts/jmevent/abstracts/FCXNL-09A02b-186...

Because, each year his explanations have become less credible, and his likelihood of being exposed grows greater. A short term prediction he bargains will buy him 3 more years.

As you mention, his 2011 analysis claims that the flat trend that we've had since 1998 is due to a combination of a solar lull and ENSO events. Solar lull was between 2002 and 2009. Hansen explains the lack of warming since 2009 by stating that there is an 18 month time lag between solar cycle changes and effects on the temperature record. Is this likely? No. The solar cycle which tells us how much radiation is emitted by the sun goes through cycles, but the amount of radiation experienced by a particular location on earth also goes through cycles. We call these seasons. So, is there evidence that the sea temperature peaks and troughs 18 months after the land temperature? Obviously not. It only lags by 1 month. Foster & Rahmstorf (2011) and Lean & Rind (2009) only use 1 month time lag as well.

"the skeptic point of view"? Which one? Sceptics form an incoherent bunch, characterised by fuzzy and magical thinking and selective use of evidence.

Some deny CO2 causes warming. But often they do accept that there is a greenhouse effect and that CO2 contributes to that, but not that more CO2 gives more warming.

Some even deny there is warming at all, simply closing their eyes for the fact that all temperature time series confirm it.

You are of the more sophisticated kind; you come with arguments that at first sight seem to be valid (altough also with very silly ones, of the kind 'it's cold in London'). You probably read WUWT and other denialist sources of misinformation that strengthen you in your beliefs. But you seem honestly interested, so there is hope that one day you'll see through the deceit you are served by vested interests.

FYI, here is a very funny graphic depiction of the "sceptic" view on climate change and ignoring inconvenient evidence:
http://www.skepticalscience.com/pics/Skeptics_guide_pg1.png
http://www.skepticalscience.com/pics/Skeptics_guide_pg2.png

Jim Hansen said when Obama was elected that the planet had until the end of Obama's first administration to 'save the world.' If whatever he wanted done wasn't, it would be the end of whatever he thinks is ending.

Are you ready to rely on Hansen's wisdom? Do you believe that it is now hopeless, and the planet can no longer be saved? Or do you believe that Hansen is a liar, and can't be trusted? You chose.

You need to stop reading skepticalscience and do some of your own research. Reading the original scientific papers is more useful than reading their analysis. You can google the titles and find them online quite easily.

The problem with skepticalscience is that they're not an open debating forum, regularly deleting posts and banning posters who disagree with the AGW hypothesis. Their favourite criticism of skeptics is that we cherry pick data, yet virtually all of their articles pick on a period of time during the last warming period. They are also guilty of slicing and dicing the debate and presenting inconsistent arguments between each article they publish. Anybody who strays from the thinly sliced debate on 1 article to link to other articles is quickly warned that they're 'off topic'. If they persist, they're banned.

The AGW hypothesis is actually a multi-headed hydra of hypotheses. Far from there being a concensus, warmists only actually agree that mankind is to blame for global warming. They have various ideas on where the missing heat is, what the climate sensitivity figure should be, what the time lag to apply to each forcing agent should be, the relative strengths of forcing agent, which datasets (land, ice, sea level etc.) should be used, how to verify climate models etc. etc.

The IPCC reports are just a digest of scientific papers that have been written since the previous report, from which the lead author for each section of the report, selects whichever view they favour. The review process is there merely to ensure that the report doesn't suffer from the glaring inconsistencies that skepticalscience does. The distortion is still evident. Most sections begin with the assertion that there has been more and more evidence to confirm the AGW hypothesis since the previous report, with the content only actually describing that there have been more scientific papers written which support the hypothesis. The science is getting weaker, whilst the ideology is getting ramped up.

Some things that might make you think. Go back to the IPCC AR1 report and compare with the IPCC AR4 report. Are there any new arguments introduced? Are the climate models getting any better with their predictions? The answer is no in both cases.

I have also tried WUWT & similar sites for a while, but they mix in articles on how bad immigrants are for the US, and clearly distort. When they do give attention to articles that find support for AGW they ridicule it and mis-represent those findings. Denialists have for years been saying it's all 'natural variation' but never have I found a coherent explanation of the observed temperature patterns. The thinking simply stops at 'natural variation'. Skeptical Science does give cohorent, sensible explanations. That convinced me. That, and the known meddling of ExxonMobil, the Koch brothers and others with a versted interest in fossil fuels. I am familiar with the behaviour of tobacco- and drug companies, which makes me more aware than average of the strategies they use to sow confusion. Anyway, good luck with your search for truth.

Probably because skeptics like myself don't pretend to know what causes climate change, in the same way that we don't know about any other element of life for which we're awaiting a scientific explanation.

The warmist argument seems to be, we reckon the earth is warming because of CO2, and it's up to everybody else to disprove us. Science doens't work that way, otherwise every man in the pub with an opinion could come up with a hypothesis. For something to be scientific, you need more than a hypothesis, you also need to make a definite, testable prediction and you need to demonstrate that observations match the prediction. It's the last 2 parts that are completely missing from the AGW debate.

"It's the last 2 parts that are completely missing from the AGW debate."

Yes, from the denialist side. Climate scientistst predicted that an increase in CO2 would lead to warming, and it has. 'Skeptics' just say we don't know why that is happening, just invoke unspecified 'natural variation'.

Many details confirm the enhanced greenhouse effect: nights warm faster than days; lower atmosphere warms, upper cools; effects of volcanos explained, etc.

You may be ignorant (and choose to be), but the science is not.

You just cherry picked 1 example which warmists always try to counter by saying the trend length is too short. I provided examples of trends since 1998 & 1880 on a global level, 1910 at a UK national level and 1772 & 1659 from the world's longest reliable temperature record.

You've provided just 1 example from the 1978-1998 period, which is 1 of only 2 periods since the global temperature record started (the other being 1910 to 1940) where the world has warmed. Warmists always cherry pick the last warming period, as with your escalator link in skepticalscience.com.

Even with the 1984 onwards example, as you say the trend is only 0.15C per decade, whilst the IPCC AR4 (2007) report says that the ensemble of climate models that they have "considerable confidence" in projects 0.2C per decade. There is a significant difference between 0.2C per decade and 0.15 per decade. At 0.15 per decade, we'd only expect a 1.5C increase in global temperature from the 2000 baseline by 2100. The IPCC AR4 report shows varying trend lengths here:-
http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/faq-3-1-figure-1.html

One can only assume that they came to the conclusion that global warming was accelertaing, hence the 0.2C per decade, as the trend lenghts shown are all significantly less.

The warming trend rate is very significant because the basic physics of CO2 as a greenhouse gas would not cause any alarm. However, the feedback effect, predicted only by computer models is what amplifies the basic physics to the 2 to 6C by 2100 figure, regularly reported. If the models are rubbish, the hypothesis is rubbish.

Its always "since 1978" with the warmists, isn't it?
I wonder why.

Actually, I don't really wonder why - and neither does anyone else with half a brain.
Cherry picking the period from 1978 to 1998 where global warming ws unusually hihg is a dead giveaway of what your agenda is.
Stop insulting our intelligence.

Also try reading the entire post, where I cover the entire temperature record, not just the period since 1998.

So where once the exceptionally hot year of 1998 was caused by global warming due to anthropogenic CO2, now it was El Nino? You people can't keep your lies straight, there are so many of them. The communists used to be like that. Now they've shifted over from red to green.

Some statements from the IPCC AR4 report

"Warming of the climate is unequivocal". If this was scientific, they would have stated over what time period, the unequivocal warming has occurred. Warming is clearly not unequivocal in the period since 1998. Warmists say this period is not statistically significant because it only represents 13 years. That's just 1 way of looking at it, it also represets 13*12 months and 13*365 days. Warmists choose to ignore trend lengths that are longer than a period since the 1960s.

"Most of the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations"

Ok, so here at least we have a period supplied. It's unclear as to what's significant about the mid-20th century when the industrial revolution in England started in the late 18th century. It's also unclear from the details of the report, how the author could make the conclusion that it's very likely (>90%) due to greenhouse gases produced by mankind. Observed sea level rises and ice melt only show the world has warmed, as it has done since the last ice age. The only thing that attributes it to mankind are the climate model projections, which allegedly the scientists were unable to produce other than by including manmade forcing agents. Curry & Webster blow this lie apart, by pointing out that scientists can create a climate model by taking a desired result and working out what the starting variables and weights should be to produce such a result. The climate model projections, of course, have been proved to have wildly overestimated actual global warming. We're far below 0.2C per decade, let alone the 0.6C the more adventurous models predicted.

I remember seeing a magician convince a gullible audience that he'd successfully predicted the winners of 6 horses. The proof being a film showing him making the predictions. How could this be? The trick was that he filmed himself selecting each horse in each race to be the winner, and then selected the appropriate clip to show the audience.
When I read the IPCC report in to how they work out which climate models to include in their reports, this trick immediately sprang to mind.
"Compared to CMIP3, the number of models and model
versions may increase in CMIP5. Some groups may submit
multiple models or versions of the same model with
different parameter settings and with different model
components included."

"The reliabilit­y of projection­s might be improved if models
are weighted according to some measure of skill and if
their interdepen­dencies are taken into account, or if only
subsets of models are considered­."

"Defining a set of criteria for a model to be 'credible'
or agreeing on a quality metric is therefore difficult.
However, it should be noted that there have been de
facto model selections for a long time, in that simulation­s
from earlier model versions are largely discarded
when new versions are developed. For example, results
produced for the Third Assessment Report of the IPCC
were not directly included in the projection­s chapters of
the Fourth Assessment Report unless an older model
was used again in CMIP3"
http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/supporting-material/IPCC_EM_MME_GoodPracticeGuida...

130,000 research papers on global warming in a small sub-field of physics? You're dreaming. You've included every scientific paper published in the last thirty years with the words carbon or warm in them.

Snow in London so climate science must be bollocks.

A man only sees want he wants to see.

Perhaps so. But sea ice doesn't matter all that much since it doesn't affect sea levels. Again you choose a parameter that seems to confirm your dogma, rather than the ones that matter.

The facts are that Antarctica is warming and losing land ice (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antarctic_ice_sheet). That does matter as it results in sea level rise.

(And what does "15C below anomaly" mean anyway?)

Antarctic SEA ice extent is increasing, just as the models predicted, and will probably increase for the next 30 years just as the models predict.
However, Antarctic LAND ice is now decreasing at an accelerating rate. Just as - yes you guessed it - just as the models predicted.
Your's is a classic misinformer 'argument' that fools no-one but those who want to be fooled.

Land Ice extent is very difficult to measure, the current method is to detect gravitational force via satellite but the scientists are unsure how accurate this is for land based results. The GRACE satellite's purpose was to measure sea levels not land.

Wikipedia isn't a credible source for politicised debates, although it does at least provide links to credible sources. If you view the history pages on most of the global warming related Wikipages, you'll note a large number of edit wars, and many articles are locked down by the 1500 Wiki admins. The content of the pages depends on the majority view of the Wiki admins rather than the view of 1000s of editors.

"What does 15C below anomaly mean"?

Latest NOAA satellite temperature anomaly is shown here:-
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/map/images/fnl/sfctmpmer_01a.fnl.anim.html

Dataset providers (CRU, NOAA, GISS, RSS, UAH etc) provide anomalies from baseline periods rather than raw temperatures. The baseline periods differ from dataset provider to dataset provider. The point of anomalies is to show whether a particular area is warmer or colder than it normally is.

Only a comet hit could be worse than a CO2 climate CRISIS, so……the former believer voting majority will step back in line with believing in CO2 fears, if the millions of people in the global scientific community respond en mass to the politicians having now walked away from climate change. If the world of science DID NOT exaggerate a climate crisis, they will march in their vast numbers because they have kids too that they have condemned to the greenhouse gas ovens.