Is global warming a scam?

you don't know what you are talking about



It IS observable though and by forming predictive models, it is possible to test hypotheses. That has been done ad finitum now so much so that the IPCC could draw the firm conclusions they did.

But supposedly you know better than them and reject the whole field of meteorology and atmospheric science as "pseudoscience"

One wonders what you actually think is "real" science then. Actually, I doubt you would even know.

No need to be rude, and not true.


I don't see how AGW can be tested in this way. Just because a computer model can be made to fit past observations doesn't mean it's going to be useful for forecasting even in the short term. Quasi-chaotic systems like the climate are essentially non-predictable in the long term.


I said the AGW thesis isn't scientific, not that meteorology isn't scientific. Meteorological conditions recur regularly so the models can be tweaked until the probability of a correct forecast can be assessed - the model can be tested. We clearly can't do the same thing with the climate.

The whole point of science is the testing of hypotheses. These models are themselves hypotheses and can be compared to observable conditions over time to see if they have genuine predictive value.


"Quasi chaotic" systems like the human brain are amenable to study so I really don't see why climate is in any way a special case that can never be predictable.


The AGW thesis has many components, all of which can and have been tested ad nauseam. Again I ask you, if the IPCC can come to a unanimous conclusion about climate change, why on earth do you think you know better and that they are all wrong?

Here is the problem:


From here (PDF). In the same vein:


From the abstract of "Verification, Validation, and Confirmation of Numerical Models in the Earth Sciences", Oreskes et al, 1994.


In chaotic systems, each event multiplies the next in a cascade of reactions. Each individual event may have a high probability of predictability, but there are so many events that the probability of predictability becomes very low very quickly. Weather forecasts are subject to this and so is the climate, since both are primarily chaotic. Similarly, I'd expect the brain to predictably respond to certain stimuli, but extending the prediction over longer time periods or event chains would result in less and less accuracy.


The central claim remains untestable.


The IPCC appears to be a pressure group rather than a research group.

Hansen is the guy that people often point to as the father of global warming.

About 20 years ago, he presented a paper with predictions.

Let's examine his hypothesis and test his model.

Three cases.

From the links:

1. Scenario A: Continued growth rate in emissions at 1.5% / year.
2. Scenario B: Emissions frozen at 1988 rates.
3. Scenario C: Drastic reductions in emissions in 1990.

From the graphs, I would say we are in scenario C, but we never had drastic emissions reductions in 1990. A and B predict much higher temps. How could that be?

And temps have been falling or leveling off sine 1998. Although CO2 levels keep going up! Where is the correlation between CO2 and temperature?

Why take drastic action that will cost trillions when the science is not 100%?

At least we know that global warming is responsible for everything.

HAHAHAHAHAHA

see, this is the problem when nonscientists try and dabble in things beyond their ken. Armstrong is a professor of Marketing and his thesis that you cannot forecast blind is all very well but it has NOTHING whatsoever to do with hypothesis testing.

I didn't say it did. The part I was taking issue with was that a model which fits past data can be useful for forecasting. This is completely wrong. As you are or were a psychologist, it only proves that you should leave comments about predictive value to the forecasting scientists.

The testing issue is separate.

it is not a fundamental plank of anything Wheel. If I form a hypothesis out of thin air that the temperature in Munich will be 33 degrees every single day from now until this day next year, it would still be testable against observation. Now, a model formed out of known components anmd trends in the atmospehere that would be expected to have higher predictive value could be tested against observed climate and weather systems over a protracted length of time. The findings lead to tweaking of the models so that in time a model is arrived at that fits observed and observable parameters. These models would not be able to give a weather forecast but they would be able to indicate trends in atmospheric and climate changes over time.

It is not just meteorologists that use such modelling and ethological techniques. Behavioural scientists, cognitive scientists, applied physicists, engineers etc etc all use such techniques and do not have to face jumped up non-scientific sceptics denouncing their studies as "pseudo-scientific"

!!!

I was a neuroscientist. Are you really implying that only forecasting scientists understand science. If so, that is frankly preposterous.

Actually chaos theory says it can be possible within certain limitations.

This is specious. The part in bold is climate forecasting by another name.


In no other area of science does running a computer model on its own qualify as a test of a hypothesis. The scientists you mention all go back to the lab and test and re-test their models. This is impossible with the climate, because the timescales are too long and there are no controls.


No, I was answering in the spirit of your post, which was frankly insulting. There's no mystique about science - only people who don't understand it think there is. However scientists normally refrain from talking professionally outside the area of their expertise. In this case the area is forecasting, and as far as I know, you aren't a forecasting specialist.

Just curious, what is your opinion of Geology then?

Individual events are relatively predictable, we know that. And the climate is a quasi-chaotic system, not completely chaotic. But fundamentally, climate forecasting is subject to the same limitations as forecasting other similar types of systems.

It's a lot less chaotic than the climate and the evidence to prove or disprove models is substantial and available in abundance.

Edit: as with Evolution, one strata in the wrong place would blow the whole thing out of the water. It is therefore disprovable and counts as science.

On the contrary, past data is probably the most important thing you can have for developing a predictive model. It's common to use old data to see if you can predict the current state of a system. Why on earth would you consider using real data to refine predictions to invalidate furture predictions?

Also, in this case the chaotic short-term patterns of weather and climate may turn out to fall in a somewhat predictable long term pattern, similar to how we can calculate turbulent fluid flow in a pipe using some approximations (such as Reynold's number) to a reasonable accuracy. So chaotic behaviour does not always doom us to a indeterminate model of atmospheric average temperature, although the huge complexity and feedbacks are not going to make it easy obviously.

actually no, for the most part scientists are dismayed by the scale of misrepresentation that journalists and non-experts with ulterior motives have used with great success to distort such subjects as:

• climate change
• GM food
• animal testing
• abortion
• stem cells
• smoking and cancer
• MMR and autism

The thing that is most galling in each of the above is that the frame of reference is so distorted that legitimate scientists are presented as an unthinking elite while the bogus "scientists" are presented as doughty maverick pioneers for truth. This effectively silences the real science which people like you then tend to discount without even consideriung it. It is VERY VERY depressing.

I believe Bell the Cat has credibility in this debate. Wheel, would you care to tell us about yourself a bit, as to why on earth what you say might carry any significance whatsoever? Because right now, i think you sound smart, but I don't really think you know what you're talking about, sorry.

Perhaps the hypothesis that climate change is a scam needs to be examined?

What, all of them? Be careful about allowing your assertions to get ahead of your data. There is tonnes of work out there being done on capturing both historical data (ice cores etc) and current data (ocean and atmosphereic temperatures) that are being input into these models. A few degrees of atmospheric temperature change inside a few decades is eminently measurable, for instance. Good climate scientists crosscheck both other models and real data.


All science is concerned with forecasting. Chemistry - what happens when you mix these compounds? Physics - what happens when I accelerate a particle to within a small percentage of the speed of light. In my own field of engineering I am concerned with what happens when I do something to a process or sequence, and I put tonnes of work into simulating my software before I go anywhere near a real system. There is no mystique in science, I agree, but understanding reality sometimes takes a model and these are inherently used to make forecasts of varying degrees of time, and saying that forecasting is a specific additional discipline of science is not correct.

I think it unlikely that a thesis proven by reference to computer models and no experimental data would be accepted for publication by a journal of applied science. There are journals (International Journal of Theoretical Physics) for theoretical disciplines, however the climate isn't one of them.


There is a paucity of data, since the climate is ephemeral, and often very localised. For instance, in the past few years Arctic ice has been decreasing (until this year), while Antarctic ice has been increasing.


Predicting individual responses isn't comparable to forecasting complex chaotic systems. For the most part, experiments are carefully designed to reduce the number of variables or simplify systems, as you illustrated.


In engineering the test is simple - often, it's as simple as 'did it break'? The AGW thesis can't be tested like that, and I don't see how it's possible to disprove it without waiting for a few decades. Even so, there'd be no control.

By the way, the IPCC's models didn't predict the last 10 years' temperature plateau, so you have to wonder about them.


I think the people who contribute to the International Journal of Forecasting would disagree with you.

This is exactly my point. Scientific models are sometimes published for the sake of advancing the researcher's reputation as well as to provide information on new techniques, as well as stake out an research area. It is appropriate in my mind that testing models against real data is done by teams with no vested interests in the results where possible.


Climate, as the term is conventionally used, is not localised and refers to an aggregate of local conditions. Weather patterns in the Arctic vs weather patterns in the Antartic are local and by themselves don't say anything conclusive. There is a tonne of weather and other data available out there, not least from studies aimed at weather prediction. We have ice cores dating back thousands of years, not to mention human records, sea temperatures etc. The problem is not lack of data, it's trying to integrate it so the models match reality.


The same principles of reducing complexity to key elements, experiementation and comparison against result apply. All scientific principles that apply to testing relatively simple propositions also apply to large enterprises like climate modelling. Modelling chaotic systems goes on all the time, and there are many chaotic system we have some understanding of (turbulent fluid flow, epidemiology etc).


If only! But as you implicitly admit here, we can disprove these models it if we wait. I'd argue we can do better using historical data. And consider what you mean by "control". By definition we have only one planet to test on, and expecting control cases is a bit unrealistic. Control cases are not an intrinsic requirement of a theory, but they're nice to have if available.


Indeed. But there is enough reports of other data out there indicating global average temperatures are rising, but I've not enough time to gather some examples together unfortunately. The scientific consensus that on average the trend is upwards, but as far as I know it does not require that each year must be steadily hotter.


That journal is just a mash-up of long term modelling techniques in many disparate fields as far as I can tell, and is only about 20 years old. It is not a journal of a specific scientific discipline at all, which supports my contention there is no such thing as a forecasting scientist as a separate field.

"The climate is inherently unpredictable and modelling can not be proven until the event occurs"? Might explain the Bush administrations response to Katrina*?

*The hurricane, in case anybody gets confussed.

As far as I'm aware, the storm (Katrina) wasn't the problem. Years and years of neglectful underfunding the maintenance of the levees, years and years of experts telling him that the Levees couldn't stand a Cat4 direct hit. Thats where Bush's incompetence shone through, and don't even get me started on the 4 day wait the people had for federal help. It would have been a completely different story had it been The Hamptons or Marthas Vinyard.

there IS no explaning the "Bush response" and no justification either.

Oh noes! Global warming causes hurricanes!

Don't worry, global warming also decreases the number of hurricanes.

http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/warmlist.htm

Hurricanes are also Bush's fault.

Should have known you need to spell things out!

The exact future path and strength of a hurricane can not be predicted accurately. According to some in in this thread that is enough reason to do nothing, New Orleans may get a direct hit or it could miss it completely, we do know for sure so lets wait and see?

The problems that occurred in New Orleans after Katrina involving failures in levees were mostly predicted by earlier simulation exercises (e.g. Hurricane Pam). By definition these simulations can not be tested until the disaster happens.

I wonder how many of the people that stayed behind read on the internet that the hurricane warning was all part of some government conspiracy?

That site is absolutely hysterical, gatzke...

Should have known YOU would need it simplified...

I never stated that a Hurricanes path can be accurately predicted did I? I said that the maintenence of the Levees were drasticaly underfunded over many many years. They were in serious disrepair and we knew that sooner or later THIS would happen to New Orleans. It was a waiting game. Bush was to blame for diverting public money away from the maintenance these Levees required. Then there was his (Lack of) immediate response.

As for how many read on the internet, probably none, as far as I remember the 8ft deep river of raw shit flowing through these poor peoples homes might have just upset the electricity and phone networks a tad.

Does anybody know if missing the point is going to be an Olympic demonstration sport?
Also is subtext a really small submarine?

If it was you would have been in the Chinese team.

Did anyone notice that the sun has had its first sunspot-free month in a century?

The Mossad took the spots away! And brought them over to Bush. Blaming the Saudis and the Iraqis for hiding their WMDs behind the spots!

The North Pole has become an island for the first time in human history.

Startling satellite pictures taken three days ago show that melting ice has opened up the fabled North-West and North-East Passages - making it possible to sail around the Arctic ice cap.

The North Pole in 1979 The North Pole in 2008

Google links: North Pole Melting

careful, the climate change naysayers will dispute that. pink snow?! man i bet you're gonna tell me the north pole isn't gay anymore. now how are republicans supposed to vote? these are conflicting ideologies.

The german Umweltbundesamt just published a study (pdf in german) by the Max-Planck-Instituts that is supposed to be the most detailed climate change forecast for germany. According to a summary by Spiegel Online we are getting away mostly fine. It gets hotter (3 degrees celsius more on average at the end of the century)
-> good for tourism and agriculture in the north (there might be even two harvests)
-> less snow of course and more rain
-> the southwest gets more arid (danger of forest fires rises)
-> people living near the Elbe might need to deal with flooding more often
-> higher chances for extremely hot summers in the south

This is untrue.

Not again!
This story keeps coming up. Here's what I posted earlier

We're all doomed, doomed I tell ya!!

When are these numbnuts going to get it?

If you look closely at the first diagram I'm sure I can make out a single parent, gay, three-legged, Half-Jewish, Half Irish pink polar bear stranded on an ice floe! Better get Al Gore to empty another lake for a photoshoot or burn millions of gallons of fuel for a rock concert to make people "aware".

Climate change = reality
Man made? NO! (We account for less than 5%)
Anything we can do? NO! (Oh, expect buy more carbon credit and keep paying thos "green" taxes)

As I said, we're all doomed, doomed I tell ya!! This Non-Ice situation is a direct cause of the falling Dollar, oh and the Iranians making WMDs 'n shit.

umm... what lake is this? Granted, I don't folllow the news all that much so I very easily could've missed this...

Hilarious!

This cult like belief in Anthropogenic Global Warming is totally due to an inability to appreciate that neither contemporary humans nor the present time are as consequential as we would like them to be.

Al Gore up the creek.



Al Gore posed for a photo paddling a canoe. But in order to make sure the canoe would float for the photo-op, 4 billion gallons of water was released from a New Hampshire dam and allowed to escape down the creek. New Hampshire was in the middle of a record drought at the time.

ROLLING STONE ARTICLE

too bad the lake wasn't actually drained (as in no more water, empty, a dessert, fish flapping in the air) as you originally claimed.

Yeah 'cause 4 billion gallons or 500 million gallons whichever way you look at it equates to a lake in your eyes?

Irony is obviously lost on you.

Ahh your ban from TT has ended then crazy one?

Piss poor post to re- enter I have to say, surely you could have done better?

When was I banned oh Arabesque one?

You must tell tell where you get this special gift that allows you to see into people minds and know exactly what they think and why they think it. Is it a divine gift?

well I thought it was funny...

Pascal's wager...

Wow!

Can't believe it took you just 5 months and 4 days to come up with such a brilliant analysis ... Your first name isn't Albert by any chance, is it?

Na, I'm just regurgitating some wisdom I found on the intarweb. Call me Makka.

Can't believe it took you only 4 hours to come up with such dazzling repartee, Oscar.