Distinguishing between causation and correlation: Global warming edition

_{Denyse O'Leary

May 5, 2018

Culture, science education}

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From David Nguyen at Think Tank, TTC Learning:

Many other science-related claims made in popular media seem to confuse causation and correlation. Dr. Nguyen’s vids are a clear, simple resource for students and interested adults who appreciate tips on sorting the claims out: Cause or correlation?

See also: Science vs Scientists, with David Nguyen. Asking, what is more prone to error: Science or scientists

Comments

Atheists: If life is 'purposeless' and 'nothing matters'... Why should we care about 'saving' the planet?Truthfreedom_{January 13, 2020
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BA77: Thanks for the great links.PaV_{May 7, 2018
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as human beings are placed under strain, then bad things happen
And for clarity's sake: Billions of dollars and decades of Global Warming hoax so Obama can pitch the above line. Oh well. Andrewasauber_{May 7, 2018
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as human beings are placed under strain, then bad things happen
How did we not demand this genius become king of the world? Move over Stephen Hawking's Essence. The multiverse isn't big enough for Obama's Super-Brain AND yours. Andrewasauber_{May 7, 2018
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How can something that came after cause something that came before
The tobacco industry should have thought of that defense: “Cigarettes can’t be a cause of lung cancer, since lung cancer predates cigarettes!” Now, for an actual example of an anachronism:
…extremist Islamic terrorism began in the 6th century ad…
Nguyen:
Since President Obama and Bill Nye are both smart people, why would they make borderline misleading statements such as quote global warming leads to terrorism unquote when they know the typical person will interpret that statement to mean global warming causes terrorism.
Even though he says “quote”, it’s hardly a quote – it’s not even a paraphrase. Here’s the actual quote from Obama: “What we know is that — as human beings are placed under strain, then bad things happen. And you know, if you look at world history, whenever people are desperate, when people start lacking food, when people — are not able to make a living or take care of their families — that's when ideologies arise that are dangerous.” As the first quote above indicates, when Nguyen says “cause” he means “one and only cause”. Could anyone in their right mind interpret the above statement from Obama as implying that global warming is the one and only cause of terrorism? No, I don’t think the “typical person” would take “world history” to mean the last couple of decades, or would think that Obama is saying that the only thing that causes “strain” is global warming. I’m not in full agreement with Obama here, but to say that this is an unfair reading from Nguyen is an understatement.goodusername_{May 6, 2018
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I'm sure Nguyen is making good points, but the constant camera jumps in the video CAUSED me to get dizzy, which CAUSED me to stop watching.polistra_{May 6, 2018
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In what I think would be surprise for Dr. Nguyen, the same lack of correlation can be found for the claim that CO2 leads to global warming.
What They Haven't Told You about Climate Change – PragerU – video CO2 and Temperature have not directly correlated for millions of years. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkdbSxyXftc The Truth about CO2 – Patrick Moore – co-founder GreenPeace - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WDWEjSDYfxc In 2009, 2 physicists published a comprehensive 115-page scientific paper (buttressed by a reference list of over 200 scientific publications) entitled “Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physics” in the International Journal of Modern Physics. Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physics – 2009 “By showing that (a) there are no common physical laws between the warming phenomenon in glass houses and the fictitious atmospheric greenhouse effects, (b) there are no calculations to determine an average surface temperature of a planet, (c) the frequently mentioned difference of 33°C is a meaningless number calculated wrongly, (d) the formulas of cavity radiation are used inappropriately, (e) the assumption of a radiative balance is unphysical, (f) thermal conductivity and friction must not be set to zero, the atmospheric greenhouse conjecture is falsified.” In a newly-published scientific paper, meteorologist and physical chemist Dr. Martin Hertzberg (and two other chemists) provide a condensed update to the Gerlich and Tscheuschner appraisal of the theoretical greenhouse effect.,,, Role of greenhouse gases in climate change - Hertzberg et al., - 2017 Conclusion The various stated definitions of the greenhouse effect have been subjected to the rigorous scrutiny and application of the fundamental laws of physics and thermodynamics. They were found to be unreal, and unless some new definition can be put forward that satisfies and complies with those laws, it can only be concluded that the concept of a ‘greenhouse gas’ or a ‘greenhouse effect’ has not been demonstrated and is thus without merit. http://notrickszone.com/2017/06/01/3-chemists-conclude-co2-greenhouse-effect-is-unreal-violates-laws-of-physics-thermodynamics/#sthash.UaMIl8Ru.l7tdWM2e.dpbs Human Emissions Saved Planet Excerpt: Over the past 150 million years, carbon dioxide had been drawn down steadily (by plants) from about 3,000 parts per million to about 280 parts per million before the Industrial Revolution. If this trend continued, the carbon dioxide level would have become too low to support life on Earth. Human fossil fuel use and clearing land for crops have boosted carbon dioxide from its lowest level in the history of the Earth back to 400 parts per million today. At 400 parts per million, all our food crops, forests, and natural ecosystems are still on a starvation diet for carbon dioxide. The optimum level of carbon dioxide for plant growth, given enough water and nutrients, is about 1,500 parts per million, nearly four times higher than today. Greenhouse growers inject carbon-dioxide to increase yields. Farms and forests will produce more if carbon-dioxide keeps rising. We have no proof increased carbon dioxide is responsible for the earth’s slight warming over the past 300 years. There has been no significant warming for 18 years while we have emitted 25 per cent of all the carbon dioxide ever emitted. Carbon dioxide is vital for life on Earth and plants would like more of it. Which should we emphasize to our children? https://uncommondescent.com/global-warming/greenpeace-founder-patrick-moore-on-global-warming/ Here is Matt Ridley’s Must Read Article on Climate Science - July 25, 2015 Excerpt: In her chapter in The Facts, Nova points out that the entire trillion-dollar industry of climate change policy rests on a single hypothetical assumption, first advanced in 1896, for which to this day there is no evidence. The assumption is that modest warming from carbon dioxide must be trebly amplified by extra water vapour—that as the air warms there will be an increase in absolute humidity providing “a positive feedback”. That assumption led to specific predictions that could be tested. And the tests come back negative again and again. The large positive feedback that can turn a mild warming into a dangerous one just is not there. There is no tropical troposphere hot-spot. Ice cores unambiguously show that temperature can fall while carbon dioxide stays high. Estimates of climate sensitivity, which should be high if positive feedbacks are strong, are instead getting lower and lower. Above all, the temperature has failed to rise as predicted by the models. http://darwins-god.blogspot.com/2015/07/here-is-matt-ridleys-must-read-article.html First off, c02 is not a well mixed gas as NASA’s own data reveals, and it is heavier than air – see article. This is extremely important as you have yet another key assumption (Like the falsified assumption Al Gore used as a “smoking gun”, that atmospheric c02 drives up temps, instead we found temps drive out more c02). So what you get from a sensor on a volcano is background c02 at a particular altitude, and particular latitude – they also apply a 70 year smoothing average to this data (just like they did when picking the absolute lowest ICE core c02 proxy data- then moved it over 35 years to have it magically line up perfectly with the Keeling curve), and the calibration rights to this and other “official” sensors around the globe are in the hands of former IPCC members. The well mixed gas concept was assumed from the get go – in fact the IPCC throughout 9K regional chemical analysis of c02 during the 20th century, other very important stomatal proxy evidence. So from the very lowest values they could pick, they then smoothed it with a 70 year average to take out the inconvenient normal variations with time which can be large – in fact it was well accepted before this nonsense, that c02 was at least 425ppm in the early 1940’s and almost as high two other times in the 20th century – so from the ground up, the make the data fit the theory, and they ignore graph that clearly showed a temp rise from the late 1920’s to the early 40’s, AND hide the 2.4F cooling from the late 40’s through the 70’s – these are their own graphs, and even their own words contradict what they say now. The entire “theory” is built out of fraud from the start. As Willie Soon tries to point out to us, almost everything that lives produces c02, and many abiotic systems as well. Example – plain old soil puts out 9X the amount of c02 than ALL of man’s activities, termites 2X the c02 than man’s use of FF. This is not science, it is a purposefully non-falsifiable theory – if it were evaluated as other non-political hypotheses, it would be thrown out in a heartbeat. If you have to heavily alter existing and current data, use less and less ground temp stations, and use mainly those that suffer from UHI effects, get rid of the medieval warm period and get caught in emails that you had to do it to make your point, when allow a warmunist activist admin privileges on wiki, and he hides well over 100 papers about the ice age scare of the 70’s, and still call yourself scientists then you should feel very ashamed over this agenda driven bull. https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/pop-quiz-for-climatistas/#comment-650163 “Deniers” in their midst – All is not well in Nobel Prize Land - Anthony Watts - July 7, 2015 Excerpt: Today, one of the nobel laureates who was an attendee has spoken out.,,, Nobel Prize Winning Physicist Dr. Ivar Giaever: ‘Global warming is a non-problem’ ‘I say this to Obama: Excuse me, Mr. President, but you’re wrong. Dead wrong.’ Dr. Ivar Giaever, a Nobel Prize-Winner for physics in 1973, declared his dissent on man-made global warming claims at a Nobel forum on July 1, 2015.,,, “I would say that basically global warming is a non-problem,” Dr. Giaever announced during his speech titled “Global Warming Revisited.”,,, Giaever now mocks President Obama for warning that “no challenge poses a greater threat to future generations than climate change”. Giaever called it a “ridiculous statement.” “That is what he said. That is a ridiculous statement,” Giaever explained.,,, “How can he say that? I think Obama is a clever person, but he gets bad advice. Global warming is all wet,” he added.,,, “When you have a theory and the theory does not agree with the experiment then you have to cut out the theory. You were wrong with the theory,” Giaever explained. Giaever said his climate research was eye opening. “I was horrified by what I found” after researching the issue in 2012, he noted. “Global warming really has become a new religion. Because you cannot discuss it. It’s not proper. It is like the Catholic Church.”,,, “Then comes the clincher. If climate change does not scare people we can scare people talking about the extreme weather,” Giaever said.,,, “If anything we have entered period of low hurricanes. These are the facts,” he continued. “You don’t’ have to even be a scientist to look at these figures and you understand what it says,” he added. “Same thing is for tornadoes. We are in a low period on in U.S.” http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/07/07/deniers-in-their-midst-all-is-not-well-in-nobel-prize-land/
bornagain77_{May 6, 2018
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Excellent post.Truth Will Set You Free_{May 6, 2018
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