Cult Science

_{January 19, 2009

Global Warming, Off Topic, Science}

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A physics professor at Princeton is the latest of hundreds and hundreds of scientists who’ve stepped up to the plate saying anthropogenic CO2 as the cause of global warming is bogus.

Professor denies global warming theory

“Carbon dioxide is not a pollutant. Every time you exhale, you exhale air that has 4 percent carbon dioxide. To say that that’s a pollutant just boggles my mind. What used to be science has turned into a cult.”

In other news, what I said before is coming to pass. I wrote that when global cooling takes hold we’ll be left with only a fervent wish that more CO2 could warm it back up. Well, a newspaper editor in Flint Michigan has started praying for global warming.

It’s time to pray for global warming, says Flint Journal columnist John Tomlinson

Selected quotes:

At December’s U.N. Global Warming conference in Poznan, Poland, 650 of the world’s top climatologists stood up and said man-made global warming is a media generated myth without basis. Said climatologist Dr. David Gee, Chairman of the International Geological Congress, “For how many years must the planet cool before we begin to understand that the planet is not warming?”

Meanwhile, the University of Illinois’ Arctic Climate Research Center released conclusive satellite photos showing that Arctic ice is back to 1979 levels. What’s more, measurements of Antarctic ice now show that its accumulation is up 5 percent since 1980.

Ironically, in spite of being shown false, we must now pray for it. Because a massive study, just released by the Russian Government, contains overwhelming evidence that earth is on the verge of another Ice Age.

Comments

So the bottom line is you don't know what the Earth's temperature should be. We will most likely always have shore lines from which to fish from- or launch boats from. We also have the know-how and technology to prevent desertification by alleviating the pressure on those tributaries. And by doing that we (could) feed the world. Better yet my property will be close to the new shore-line. So I say let it melt and please make it sooner rather than later! :)Joseph_{January 27, 2009
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Based on the article you just referenced, and its mention of desertification, water resources under stress, probably food shortages, and the flooding of major tributaries and shorelines where millions of human beings live in order to live off of seafood and other coastal resources now set to be decimated, I'd say the answer to your query is, in a phrase: Lower than it is now. (Or will be within a few decades.) Of course, granted, it has been both much warmer and much colder in the distant past. We've had periods where ice sheets came down to Missouri and the coast of Florida was hundreds of miles outward from now, and also periods where warm blooded reptiles found the polar regions nice and warm and not a flake of snow probably fell anywhere south of the Arctic circle. But now, as with other kinds of articles, the one you referenced is a fool's errand when it comes to predictions that far out. I would cede that point.S Wakefield Tolbert_{January 27, 2009
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This just in: Global warming 'irreversible' for next 1000 years I haven't read the PNAS article yet.Joseph_{January 27, 2009
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OK, so what is the temperature the Earth should be?Joseph_{January 26, 2009
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Joseph, I was referring to the exact mathematical quantification of the mass=energy relationship. Olinto de Pretto certaintly had some insights generally regarded as ahead of his time. (But then, so did Karl Marx for that matter.) He was certainly onto something but was neither the first to come up with his notions nor the only one at the time of publication. This is not to say his ideas have no merit. They do. But, when it comes to the quantification of mass and energy at the extremes, and how one relates to another under a duress not commonly seen by the human eye and general experience, Hasenohrl gets the billing. His is a more direct linkage. The probloem is that Hasenohrl, like de Pretto long before, did not make a connection to HOW this might come about. Einstein DID, clerical duties aside. Eventually. In fact, Einstein did not make ALL the connections right away either. His first paper made no mention of the term Relativity. He HATED the very term. Said first draft being called "On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies." But today, we can, if getting past all this bruha about windmills and chicken manure advocacy from the radical enviros, use nuclear energy, as well as, say, maybe even sending Little Adolf over in Iran straight to the Stratosphere. If need be.... :) PS: If we really want to get picky, we can trace the REAL heritage of all this squarely back to Galileo, who also made early notes on relativistic behaviors among objects, though the energy/mass dichotomy was not something he hit on. Galileo noticed that objects behaved the same on a moving ship the same as standing on solid ground. And YET, from shore the object's motion, say, a ball being tossed, appears to arc in a parabola-but NOT to the man tossing it. So it went.S Wakefield Tolbert_{January 26, 2009
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Tolbert There's all kinds of data on soot (black carbon) on the web. It's listed as a significant forcing factor in the 2007 IPCC technical report. It's shown to be about half of what CO2 contributes but some studies say it's at least equal to CO2 forcing and some say it's greater. There are also studies showing the earth's albedo has been decreasing. This is a difficult measurement and the study, done by measuring the brightness of the moon when it is illuminated only by light reflected from the earth has only been going on since 2002 or so IIRC. The study measured a 1% decrease in reflected light during that time. It's not possible to separate out different things that contribute to it either. Cloud cover, snow cover, soot, land use changes, all contribute to overall albedo. The biggest factor right now appears to be the cosmic ray hypothesis which generates more or less high altitude clouds which reflect more or less sunlight. The sun's magnetic field throttles the intensity of cosmic rays. Extreme solar minimums line up quite well with historical cold periods. The sun has been unusually quiet for the past year, a one hundred year low, and sure enough we're having one of the coldest winters in decades. It snowed yesterday or the day before somewhere in the Middle East for only the second time in recorded history. If the sun stays quiet we'll get a hard lesson in what global cooling is like and it's a LOT worse than warming. The primary producers in the food chain don't produce much on frozen ground. Wherego the primary producers go the rest of the food chain including us.DaveScot_{January 25, 2009
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Oh–I meant to add that physicist’s name who hit upon E=MC2 was Friedrich Hasenohrl.
Olinto de PrettoJoseph_{January 25, 2009
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Eddington's experiment was in 1919- the one that confirmed Einstein's equation. So what is the DATA that demonstrates that man-made CO2 is the cause of the warming? What is the temperature the Earth should be? How do you know? Until we know what temp range the earth should be we really don’t have a clue as to any warming. Warming would be just a relative thing. As for Dave's point, there was a show on climate change either on the History or Discovery channel. One scientists was trying to show how snow reflects sunlight and the lack of snow would absorb it. This was to demonstyrate what happens once the Arctic ice-pack is very instrumental in keeping this planet from getting too warm. No white snow and the remaining water would be free to heat up. To do this he put two pieces of colored cardbord on the snow. The temp was well below freezing. On piece of cardboard was white and the other was black. After only a couple of minutes the white piece measured pretty much what the putside temp was. However the black piece was reading above 90 degrees F!!! If that doesn't confirm what Dave posted nothing will.Joseph_{January 25, 2009
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Oh--I meant to add that physicist's name who hit upon E=MC2 was Friedrich Hasenohrl. As to the very last part about ideological tendencies, I also meant to add that while we're on the topic of hypocrisy and other well-noted political gamesmanship, it should be worth mentioning that like the tobacco internal documents now known to contain phrases such as "doubt is our product", likewise the AGW denialists have this as their main tactic.S Wakefield Tolbert_{January 24, 2009
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Joseph, I used to be in the category of the AGW denialists. No, science is NOT done by consensus; however, the consensus AMONG peers, and even accounting for "peer pressure", has far more meaning than the opinions of those far outside the main field. We do not say that consensus is the reason the earth is round and that other star systems actually exist rather than a fixed Ptolemaic place in the Cosmos and flat earthiness or thinking that Orion is really a hunter who stalks prey across the sky. Consensus was REACHED on these issues bit by bit as the data accumulated to the point of being utterly overwhelming. Albert Einstein's work for the Swiss patent office as a clerk was neither his main profession nor his only profession--nor what his life goal via his education. In-between avoidance of getting caught looking idle he would hurriedly make notes of his latest ideas. Ideas from a first rate mind, not a "mere" patent office clerk. Right? Nor was Einstein the only one to hit upon certain ideas (again, known by consensus LATER, even if not immediately then). His famous equation E=mc2 was hit upon and published by Austrian physicist (not a clerk) one year before Einstein worked it out. Never heard of this guy? Einstein, however, gets the Physics "Street Cred" on this one for connecting the dots that lead to a relation to relativity. Verdammit! His ideas have been tested and tested and tested, starting with the now famous Arthur Eddington experiment in 1911 and culminating today with predictions of why gold looks yellow rather than the usual silver for most metals (relativistic effects in the electron cloud) and where particles in the Hadron collider will fall if not boosted fast enough, black holes effects on surrounding objects, particle/wave duality issues, etc, etc. I take it as given that in most real-life encounters, journalists, economists, and veterinarians, no matter how saintly, generally step outside their main professions when making statements on AGW. The Relativity denialists, then, as now, were cranks. They proposed all manner of theories to account for the observations; objects for some reason alter in the direction of acceleration, alleged mathematical trickery, etc. Experiments confirmed matters, and THIS fact led to consensus, not the other way around. The last possible stand for today's AGW denialists, minus the hundreds of computer models and experiments showing how carbon does build up heat and that even slight increases have a corresponding heat signature, would be the work of Dr. High Ellsaesser, who claims that for a variety of reasons Co2 from Man is just not significant next to background (ambient) levels from natural processes of plant and animal respiration. ****************** Dave, I have not seen anything from Scientific American or Real Climate regarding soot and other sources (other than ice melt, naturally) that would contribute significantly to the reduction in albedo, or reflectivity. One guesses, however, that while your idea might have some merit and is probably in possession of a kernel of truth in principle, in the years since the various Clean Air acts here and in Europe, we'd have to go back to Dicksonian levels of soot belching and ten million factories across the lands to do what you suggest. Even if ice had an albedo close to that of the MOON (fresh black asphalt, at that) it would reflect quite a bit of sunlight. Imagine if the moon were made of ice or silver rather than something most people would say looks like light colored TAR up close! I would need to see some reference to this notion that thousands of miles away the remainder of industrial output is altering ice albedo to the point where it is melting regardless of temps at the surface. The loss of albedo WOULD do what you suggest, as seawater would retain heat far better than any area previously melted away that used to be ice. But I need more info on that. This is the first I've heard of what you suggest. Antarctica HAS had more snowfall in recent years, and that WOULD make for two situations the denialists MIGHT be able to crow about: Long term it could extend Antarctica's "micro-climate" effect for THAT region. Second, it would temporarily forestall any significant rise in sea levels; the costs of which would make the recent TRILLION-something bailout seems like a couple of spare dimes. A recent glance at reams of stats provided by Scientific American, however, purports to show that overall Antarctica is beginning to THAW out at the edges at least. Now granted, the ARCTIC doing the same thing is not as dire. The pressure applied by the icecap in this context makes up for any sea level rise. In other words, this is like the old trick of asking someone at a cocktail party where the level in their glass will be once the ice all melts (answer: the same, of course). But for Antarctica, the situation is different due to her caps being anchored above land. Yes, it has been noticed by economists like Robert Samuelson among others the hypocrisy regarding Kyoto and other efforts at managing carbon. Yes, there does seem to be an ideological and political agenda among our alleged betters and elites to use AGW as the anvil to hammer away at the sins of capitalism. Politicians and journalists and other deep thinky-think types are buzzards and maggots feasting on opportunities they themselves are powerless to create. However, the unfortunate fact that the "same" kinds of people who were once involved in anti-industrial activities do seem to join the coattails for semi-socialisti notions due to "saving the Planet" (what a slogan!) is another issue. We have to separate the issues out.S Wakefield Tolbert_{January 24, 2009
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Tolbert Antarctica, except for that tiny portion of it called the western penninsula, has been getting colder not warmer. In fact the entire southern hemisphere has not experienced any overall warming. All warming, warming which CEASED 10 years ago, was in the northern hemisphere. Moreover, the CO2 warming model predicted greater warming as altitude increases in the troposphere. In reality the greatest warming is at the surface. So what's special about the northern hemisphere? First of all that's where all the people are concentrated. People produce large amounts of what's called black soot by burning various things like slash and burn agriculture, industrial smokestacks, diesel engine exhaust, electrical generation, heating of homes with wood & coal burning furnaces, and things of that nature. The thing about black soot is that it can travel up to several thousand miles in the atmosphere before settling out on the ground. That's enough to make it from high northern latitudes all the way to the north pole but not enough to go from there to the southern hemisphere. What's special about black soot is that when it settles onto snow cover it darkens the snow. On permanent snow cover partial melts concentrate it on the surface because it floats. So each year's accumulation just builds up on the surface making it darker and darker. Anyone who lives next a highway with diesel trucks on it in the north where you get snowbanks on the side of the road know about this because when those snow banks melt they get almost black on top. What does that do? Well just about everyone knows that dark things exposed to sunlight get hotter than light things. This has dramatic effects on glaciers (which are like really big snowbanks) causing accelerated melting and it also generally makes the surface warmer but doesn't contribute any warming to higher altitudes in the troposphere. Notably, and unlike CO2, this matches all the observations - warming greatest at the surface, warming predominantly in the northern hemisphere, accelerated melt of glaciers and other permanent ice cover like the arctic sea ice. The northern hemisphere is also where the southern oscillation (El Nino and La Nina) occurs and which has dramatic effects on northern hemisphere precipitation and temperature patterns. If any component of the global warming from 1978 to 1998 was anthropogenic the culprit was predominantly black soot, not CO2. This is politically impalletable for most of the world outside the United States bacause the United States rightly considers black soot a pollutant and beginning with the Clean Air Act in 1963 the U.S. drastically reduced its soot emissions. The U.S. doesn't use many diesel engines, forces power plants and industrial sources to filter soot from smokestacks, doesn't heat many homes by burning wood or coal, doesn't use slash & burn agriculture, and prevents forest fires. Europe on the other hand is in love with diesels even in light trucks and passenger cars. Generally speaking the poorer the country the more black soot it produces. It's politically correct to blame the wealthy powerful United States for global warming and politically incorrect to blame poor countries. As the SNL church lady would say, "Well, isn't that just precious?"DaveScot_{January 24, 2009
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We need not ask veterinarians and economists their opinions on this any more than a cocktail waitresses insights on quantum mechanics.
What about asking a certain patent clerk about relativity?Joseph_{January 23, 2009
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As to the discussion about what caused this, the consensus is that Co2 is the proximate cause of the warming.
But science is not done via consensus. It is done via investigation and data gathering. So what is the DATA that demonstrates that man-made CO2 is the cause of the warming? What is the temperature the Earth should be? How do you know? Until we know what temp range the earth should be we really don't have a clue as to any warming. Warming would be just a relative thing.Joseph_{January 23, 2009
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(23) Joseph, Yes--winter is cold. Like RealClimate guys say when people talk about Antarctica being cold: "Yeah--THANKS SO MUCH, but we already knew that" Although water vapor has been increasing (and can be pushed from other areas, in the case of the Southeast the Gulf of Mexico), the standard model for AGW is that if the theory and computer modeling is accurate, we'd see more warming at the poles than at temperate latitudes. And that is exactly what we see so far. The poles are warming, and since 1950 the icecap (for the Arctic) has an area larger than California now gone. The temsp around the Continental US would not be all that different over the last half century. This is due to the physical principle that its easier to warm a relatively colder area and have that heat retained than to heat up an already relatively warmer area. As to the discussion about what caused this, the consensus is that Co2 is the proximate cause of the warming. No serious climatologist doubts this. The mysterious "17,000" scientists nor the "650" do not count. We need not ask veterinarians and economists their opinions on this any more than a cocktail waitresses insights on quantum mechanics. We have division of labor and science for a reason in the West. That's how things work best.S Wakefield Tolbert_{January 22, 2009
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The reason we’re getting more snow in unusual amounts this year and last is due to more water vapor in the air. This is caused by warming.
But the air has to be cold in order for snow to fall. Is that also caused by warming? My apologies but I couldn't resist- I believe the discussion is not so much about warming as it is about the cause(s). Although warming in general is also a hot topic (couldn't resist that old one either).Joseph_{January 22, 2009
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where are veterinarians Meant to ask: "WHY are veterinarians included" in this tally?S Wakefield Tolbert_{January 21, 2009
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DonaldM: Winter does not violate the precepts of AGW. Nor does the extent of winter sea ice around Antarctica, nor does snow, per se. It just snowed in Columbia SC the other day for the first time in years. But it has not been as cold this year as in some years past. And by no means did we approach the record of -5 F in Atlanta or -2 F in Columbia, temps that occured in 1982 and have never been heard from since. It rarely snows at such temps. And there is more precipitation over the Mojave desert than the North Pole. The reason we're getting more snow in unusual amounts this year and last is due to more water vapor in the air. This is caused by warming. This is why the Northeast is being rocked this year by a VERY RARE meteorological phenomenon called "thundersnow"--which usually happens in the Deep South on those rare occasions we see snow flakes in the air and warm Gulf air clashes with cold air forced down from Apalachians. This year it is noticed in more places than the South. As to the "650" scientists--where are veterinarians included in this tally, just as that mystic "17,000" signitories referenced John Stossel's famous story about all those AGW deniers in one of his books. Are engineers, economists(!?), statisticians, physicians, TV weathermen, and others, really reknown for any special insight on what climatologists have known for decades now?S Wakefield Tolbert_{January 21, 2009
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LOLZ DOOM DOOOOM err... I mean, yes! No global warming! Although, I'm rather suspicious of suggested ice ages. :-PDomoman_{January 21, 2009
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Khan wrote:
Professors’ salaries are piddling compared to the private sector.
There are intangibles that mere salary doesn't even approach. Like job security and the actual work/salary ratio vs. the private sector, for instance. Not to speak of the mystical aura of quasi-sainthood - scientists working for the government are magically bestowed with superhuman knowledge and impartiality. As long as they toe the political line with their fellow ubermenschen, of course.
Second, the oil companies have the biggest financial interest in global warming. so if you want to talk about science being driven by financial interests, look no further than global warming denial.
Oil companies, like tobacco companies before them, are trying to cover their posteriors. Doesn't make it right, necessarily, but at least the researchers involved are not imbued with that aura I mentioned previously. Their data and conclusions are actually scrutinized closely by their peers, which is supposed to happen in science. Instead of, you know, just swallowing whole whatever the anointed scientistic priesthood doles out from the altar. And it's telling you can't bring yourself to type "skepticism" instead of "denial".angryoldfatman_{January 21, 2009
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Ok, technically he said something like a whale: "In North America the black bear was seen by Hearne swimming for hours with widely open mouth, thus catching, like a whale, insects in the water. Even in so extreme a case as this, if the supply of insects were constant, and if better adapted competitors did not already exist in the country, I can see no difficulty in a race of bears being rendered, by natural selection, more aquatic in their structure and habits, with larger and larger mouths, till a creature was produced as monstrous as a whale." This passage was expunged from later editions.Davem_{January 21, 2009
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interested, any references for that claim? in any case, if you want to say global warming research is driven by financial interests, then you must say the same about global warming skepticism. like here, for example. a power company "donating" $100,000 to a global warming skeptic. that's not a research grant, btw. that is right into his pocket. http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/GlobalWarming/Story?id=2242565&page=1Khan_{January 20, 2009
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khan....FAR more money is spent on trying to confirm global warming than trying to disprove it. the governments of the world are spending many billions of dollars on this at the"science" level. don't kid yourself....there is TONS of money in global warming...interested_{January 20, 2009
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Good point Davem! (but according to the evolution theory the cows turned into whales)critiacrof_{January 20, 2009
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The consensus seems to be that if global warming is man made we have to do something about it because the polar bears will go extinct. On the other hand, Darwin said that without competition bears could turn into whales.Davem_{January 20, 2009
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@Andrew Sibley: To keep the smoke in the smokey room fresh perhaps? To me it's clear that evolutionists have both to much and to little time, to many and to little variations, to many fantasies and not enough logic. It has become so complex that they can say whatever they want to say and make up the facts according to their theory. More on topic: I don't think things like an ice age will happen again. At least not soon. Plus like you said: everything used to be a lot warmer with more CO2. Can global warming be that bad?critiacrof_{January 20, 2009
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It’s related to Darwinian evolution in that both are cult science driven by political, social, financial, and ideologic goals.
I'll just address the financial part. First, although there are some evolutionary biologists who have made money from their popular press books, I have never met anyone who got into academic evolutionary biology, or climatology, or academics in general, for the money. and if I did, I would question their sanity. Professors' salaries are piddling compared to the private sector. Second, the oil companies have the biggest financial interest in global warming. so if you want to talk about science being driven by financial interests, look no further than global warming denial.Khan_{January 20, 2009
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What used to be science has turned into a cult. [The attitude was] ‘Give me all this money, and I’ll get the answer you like.’ [Climate change theory has] been extremely bad for science. It’s going to give science a really bad name in the future.
Ditto for Darwinian “science.” The irony is that the challenges presented by ID theorists and manmade global warming skeptics represent a force for keeping honest science on track. These are the friends of science, but are called the enemies of science. It’s all upside down and backwards.GilDodgen_{January 20, 2009
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A Rasmussen poll reveals that 59% of Democrats continue to believe in the AGW narrative, in spite of the recent cooling, while only 21% of Republicans do. More evidence that the liberal worldview is based on emotion as opposed to fact. http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/issues2/articles/44_say_global_warming_due_to_planetary_trends_not_peopleallanius_{January 20, 2009
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DonaldM, The rising snow levels and frigid temps are a product of global warming. If the snow levels were very low and the temps warmer that too would be a product of global warming. And if nothing had changed that would also be a product of global warming. Thank you Dave for continuing to post on this nonsense.Joseph_{January 20, 2009
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What is not mentioned by climate change supporters is that according to paleo-geologists the CO2 levels were typically arouned 2000 ppm in the carboniferous to the cretaceous with a global average temperature of 20C and an abundance of life. When scientists talk about evolution they are happy to speak of millions of years, when talking about climate change they only go back a few thousand years to the ice age. Why is that I wonder?Andrew Sibley_{January 20, 2009
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