Global Warming Consensus?

[fsol]

No, the IPCC claims that there is a consensus among scientists. They do not demonstrate that such a consensus exists, nor have they tested the hypothesis that there is such a consensus. We can forgive them for that, because the IPCC does not do either science or statistics, they only review the science (its their stated purpose.)

Their summary claims that a consensus among scientists exists. Surely they based this claim on evidence, right? Where is it? Who did the study which lead to this facet of the summary? Perhaps they simply failed to cite the evidence for a consensus. Alas, we might be able to find it inspite of their failing to cite it.

Where is it?

A quick selective quoting and no apology? Well that's fine and dandy with me. Do as you will.

 

[fsol]

Actually, a quick paragraph is enough. By your own general knowledge you know it is a blatant lie to assert that these things are good. They are possibly good, and they are possibly not good.

Actually, if you talk to people that actually know about this stuff you will realise that a quick paragraph is not enough. Show your supporting studies or shut up.

Is that harsh? I don't really think so. People try to get away with asserting so called truths without out backing up their assertions. Well in the real world that isn't how things work. If you have evidence of your claims, please show it to us. If you don't well...

I am sure you have the life cycle analysis at your finger tips, just waiting to bestow it upon us...I don't know...or maybe not.

The document is SPM040507, table SPM 3. I only see it in PDF.

Basically, here is what we seem to have. After all the hoopla and the "science" and the "consensus", they got to actually suggest something, right? And this table is the short story version - basically a laundry list of everything everybody has claimed was a good thing, including a bunch of old hackneyed green concepts like recycling. They add up the probable effects of these solutions (optimisticly) and conclude the future is dismal. Sounds familiar, right? Kind of like the debacle of Kyoto? Or the current prices for carbon offsets and carbon credits?

For an actual solution go here.



Required Legalistic Disclaimer:

I swear that I am a humble supplicant at the heavenly fonts of impeccable and sublime knowledge of minions of consensual climatologists and lackeys of scientific scientists. I will not fall prey to evil whispers of slimy Exxon dogs of greedy capitalism. All hail the HypnoToad!

Decent general FAQ on global warming from IPCC, the International Panel of Consenting Climatologists

summary for policymakers

Go nuclear and stop bitching about global warming.

So no actual quotes so that we may all discuss the same thing then.

 

[Schneibster]

I think it's about the implied assertion that all "pro-AGM" people will feel this way, as if there's some "consensus" in the way to reply to questioning posts.

Actually, the arguments for and against are pretty well established; and new information seems for quite some time to have been supporting AGW. People who pay attention to this raise these points, and most of them are aware of them.

I also find it interesting that not one single comment on this thread has addressed the post I made on page 1. I made the following points:
1. All of the sources that mhaze presented get their funding from a small number of groups. I did not bother to show the political goals of these groups, other than to present an article that traces their development backwards, and is very well sourced. Anyone who has been paying attention to current events for the past five decades is perfectly capable of discerning the likely goals of such organizations; what I intended to do is to show their methods. It is my belief that a dispassionate evaluation of those methods is sufficient to support my position in the matter, dismissing these as reliable sources since those methods are demonstrably deceitful.
2. The "references" presented by these groups to support their position papers fail to refer to reliable, uninterested, non-partisan groups. Some even reference papers on their own sites as if they were authoritative sources. This is bad journalistic practice; since there is obviously no value to the sources, this is therefore obvious evidence of intent to deceive. The unwary will not bother to check the source of the linked "evidence," and will assume that the article is well-sourced.
3. Position papers do not name authors, article titles, or publications where scientific evidence is referred to, but refer to the papers they reference in such a way that they can avoid actually having to deal with an angry scientist whose work has been deliberately misconstrued, misrepresented, or outright lied about, in court.

These sources make outrageous claims that, if the actual sources are checked, do not stand up. How many such claims does one have to debunk before it is justified to state that following up on such claims is a waste of time? I have followed up on literally hundreds here on this forum, and have yet to find one that was actually presenting correct information that could be legitimately inferred from the content of the paper cited; in many cases, simply determining what the citation was actually referring to was difficult or impossible, because these people deliberately avoid providing them, in order to both avoid liability for lying about someone's work, and to avoid easy disproof of what they claim. What do you suppose the goal of such omnipresent obfuscation might be? Do you conclude that it is honest? I do not.

I also don't think it's very honest to avoid referring to arguments you have no answer for. It smacks of precisely the same sort of obfuscation. If there are clear answers, they would be easy enough to google up. That none are presented speaks clearly, I think.

I would be grateful if you could answer a few queries I raised a while back, since they do see troublesome to me:

I will presume you are honestly interested in the answers and take the time and trouble to answer them.

Since hurricanes and other winds are driven by the temperature difference between the poles and the equator,

They are not. Winds are driven by pressure differences. Pressure differences are created by warm air rising, and cold air falling; this is a matter of simple physics. Warm air absorbs evaporating moisture. Over the sea, the source of the moisture is obvious. Since air is not a very good conductor of heat and water is, and since evaporation requires the addition of latent heat, that means the bulk of the latent heat must come from the sea. Therefore, the more heat there is in the sea, the more evaporation will occur; and the more heat there is in the air, the more water it can carry. Therefore, both rising air temperature and rising sea temperature play a role; but the role of the sea is greater, because the heat content of the sea is far greater (both because it is more dense, and because it has a higher specific heat).

Now, warm air rises. And there is a strong temperature gradient from the surface to the tropopause; the lapse rate on average in the troposphere is 6.5°C/km. Relative humidity varies against absolute water content with temperature; for the same water content, relative humidity is higher for a lower temperature. Condensation, therefore, increases as temperature falls, for a given water content. So as warm, moist air rises, condensation occurs.

Condensation, of course, releases some of the latent heat of the water; this warms the air again, after it has cooled by conduction and radiation, and causes it to rise further.

What I am describing here is the exchange of heat between the surface and space by convection, driven by latent heat. (Actually, exchange between the surface and the tropopause, but most of the heat that makes it to the tropopause will be radiated to space- the rising of warm air is not dependent merely upon moisture content, it just accentuates it.) This mechanism accounts for everything from gentle rain to hurricanes and thunderstorms. It's the size of the area providing the heat and moisture, and therefore the amount of heat and moisture provided, that makes the difference.

The thing to remember here is that this is heat doing work as it moves; and the greater the difference between source and destination, the more energy is available to do work. So the difference between the land and the stratosphere over the US Southwest generates thunderstorms; but the difference between the sea and the stratosphere in the Atlantic and Pacific generates hurricanes and typhoons. The difference is not because of the temperature gradient, but because of the size of the area over which the gradient exists.

It's also got to be obvious that areas miles away will have an enormously greater impact than one thousands of miles away. Space is pretty much the same temperature everywhere; about 2°K. So heat will always flow to space. The question is, how much heat? The more there is, the more will flow; and the more energy that moving heat will make available to do work. The surface-to-space gradient, then, being both far greater in magnitude over a given distance, and far closer, has an enormously greater effect on hurricanes than the equatorial-polar gradient.

I'd like to see the source you cite as stating that the temperature difference between the equator and poles is the "driving force" behind winds and hurricanes.

how do the climate scientists come to assert that GW will cause more and stronger hurricanes?

1. "The" climate scientists?
2. Over what time period?
3. Is it so surprising that a greater temperature gradient (space being, after all, pretty much constant) indicating greater heat flow should be predicted to generate more violent storms more often?

What justification is used to dismiss the fact that the other planets are warming rapidly as irrelevant to what's happening on Earth?

Satellites observing the Sun. You ARE aware that there are solar observatories in orbit, right? SOHO, STEREO, KORONAS? How about Earth-bound ones? Come on, why is what's happening on Mars suddenly more important than what's happening in Earth orbit? Do you have a picture of the Solar System as a bustling neighborhood? Sorry to disappoint you, but it would take you 12 years to walk to the Moon if you didn't stop for anything; the distance to Mars is thousands of times greater. Who cares what's happening to Mars? We have local observations of solar activity. If the Sun is varying in output enough to heat Mars up, don't you think there might be something coming out of the astronomy and astrophysics community about it? And don't you suppose that the press might just have heard about that? So where are all the articles? Nowhere, because astronomers are reporting nothing of the kind, using instruments far more sensitive than the climate of Mars.

Satellite and balloon data originally implied that stratospheric temperatures were not rising as fast as ground and sea temperatures, whereas theory said they should be rising faster. This has been explained by satellite calibration drift and something else for balloons. However, I understand that the relevant correction factors bring the readings much closer to those seen on the ground. However, they still aren't greater than the ground changes, which current theory says they should be. How is that explained, and are historical readings from satellites and balloons likewise affected?

This is a sufficiently large hodge-podge of assertions and conclusions from those assertions, without good differentiation between fact, conjecture, and conclusion, that it is difficult for me to even discern what you're saying here. Could you please provide sources for these assertions, and for that matter quantify the specific assertions you are making, as opposed to conclusions from those assertions, so that a reasonable person could make some sort of comment?

Let me just say again that I'm not denying the climate seems to be heating up, and I'm ready to acknowledge that humans are behind it, if the evidence warrants it. However, I want to see facts, not assertions.

Then present some. I see nothing here but assertions with nothing to back them up.

 

[mhaze]

Actually, if you talk to people that actually know about this stuff you will realise that a quick paragraph is not enough. Show your supporting studies or shut up.

Is that harsh? I don't really think so. People try to get away with asserting so called truths without out backing up their assertions. Well in the real world that isn't how things work. If you have evidence of your claims, please show it to us. If you don't well...

I am sure you have the life cycle analysis at your finger tips, just waiting to bestow it upon us...I don't know...or maybe not.

So no actual quotes so that we may all discuss the same thing then.

This genuinely puzzles me. Yes I have looked into life cycle analysis and recently posted to this forum a link to a complex downloaded excel model for just that. But isn't it obvious that if there is serious controversy over whether something is good, or bad - say biofuels - it isn't correct to just say "GO DO IT???".

I don't get it. It isn't my point to change the content of this thread unnecessarily, OP == "Global warming consensus".

Is there consensus over biofuels? H**L NO!

 

[rockoon]

A quick selective quoting and no apology? Well that's fine and dandy with me. Do as you will.

I quoted the only paragraph of yours in that post which was on topic to this thread.

There is a moral highground here and maybe its not mine.. but its absolutely not yours so don't lie to yourself and pretend that it is.

I am going to ask you one more time:

Do you have evidence, or can you cite any evidence, that there is a consensus among scientists in regards to global warming?

The choices are:

Yes, No, and Ignore.

I do realize that you don't want to answer 'No' but probably cannot subtantiate a 'Yes' without a circular reference (the IPCC claim of a consensus does not substantiate their claim of a consensus)

 

[mhaze]

Actually, the arguments for and against are pretty well established; and new information seems for quite some time to have been supporting AGW. People who pay attention to this raise these points, and most of them are aware of them.

I also find it interesting that not one single comment on this thread has addressed the post I made on page 1. I made the following points:
<snip of good stuff>

FYI. You probably got this but just to be sure - I did not answer those good quesitons because I was not intending to support or endorse the results of a simple google search , just doing the search and reporting on it.

No more than I would endorse the results of a similar search on say, abortion, except to say that it was what it was...

 

[varwoche]

Change the subject then a bit, eh?

That was not the subject; you would like to change the subject.

In the whimsical universe you post from, direct evidence of agw consensus (that's evidence, not proof mind you) somehow is a change of subject in a thread titled "Global Warming Consensus?". [loud guffaw]

 

[mhaze]

In the whimsical universe you post from, direct evidence of agw consensus (that's evidence, not proof mind you) somehow is a change of subject in a thread titled "Global Warming Consensus?". [loud guffaw]

Well, let's see how wrongly wrong you have wrongfully situated your wrongness.

We could look at the availability of surveys on individual scientists and engineers attitudes for any number of reasons. For example we might not want to support or disprove AGW? but simply to see how informed or misinformed they were. If anything, then it is I that changed the topic thread from "Global Warming Consensus" to a review of surveys of individuals. In any case, clearly any well designed survey that ranks opinions on subjects on a scale of 1-10 could be interpreted various ways.

You want to assert what, exactly? Apparently something that does not not seem related to my general input to this thread.

 

[varwoche]

Well, let's see how wrongly wrong you have wrongfully situated your wrongness.

Let's...

We could look at the availability of surveys on individual scientists and engineers attitudes for any number of reasons.

True. I challenged some of your cites not because they were surveys of scientists, but because they were opinion pieces about surveys (amongst other reasons).

You want to assert what, exactly? Apparently something that does not not seem related to my general input to this thread.

My post that you are complaining about wasn't specifically addressed to you mhaze (though I can see why you thought it was, since I did take another swipe at your flimsy cites).

 

[mhaze]

Let's...

True. I challenged some of your cites not because they were surveys of scientists, but because they were opinion pieces about surveys (amongst other reasons).

Right, apparently showing the diverse interpretations that can be derived from a survey, eg., opinion pieces, is somehow not okay around here. Consider for a moment one issue. Let us just say that you would like to establish that global warming is caused by man made activities and to do that, you survey scientists and engineers asking them to respond on a scale of 1-10 based on how strongly they agree with that statement.

Assume further (yes I have worked in survey design) that the statements are mixed on the page, not preloaded or sequenced, and grammer is changed around as required, and there is a large sample. Obviously, you will get responses that go over the range. Obviously, you or I can then look at the results and draw differing conclusions.

Now given that - -- it's something of a true leap of faith to go with a word like "consensus". I'd also be curious how that word translated in other languages - the IPCC reported in many. Of course for China they are going to read those two symbols and just say "Honorable Party alway say this crap about total agreement". And the hypocracy is obvious, no need to even discuss it. You do not because that would be causing the elder statesmen to lose face.

Further I do not know what these arguments are really about. Rockoon is correct, or precisely, a statement can be made as to the conditions under which his assertions are correct. If you don't like that, tough. You are certainly correct, again, under precise grammer. Rockoon does not like that, well, that's tough.

But somehow that "consensus" term is preloaded emotionally and really important. It will get people going....

 

[Schneibster]

The point is, the assertion of consensus is one thing; the evidence is another. And so also for the assertion and evidence of a lack of it. If one ignores the assertions, and examines the evidence, what does one find? So far, the evidence (as opposed to the assertions) is that there is, in fact, a scientific consensus on the matter, on the part of the scientists best qualified to have an evidence-backed opinion. No evidence to the contrary has been presented here; all I have seen is assertions. On the other hand, the mere existence of the IPCC report is evidence that such a consensus does exist; how strong that evidence might be is a matter of debate, apparently, but that it does exist and does support the assertion that a consensus exists, and that consensus is that AGW is real, is not.

ETA: and before we go there, the IPCC report is by no means the only such piece of evidence. It is therefore obvious that there are multiple pieces of evidence pointing to the existence of a consensus, and none pointing to its nonexistence. What conclusion is it reasonable to draw in the face of this?

 

[mhaze]

The point is, the assertion of consensus is one thing; the evidence is another. And so also for the assertion and evidence of a lack of it. If one ignores the assertions, and examines the evidence, what does one find? So far, the evidence (as opposed to the assertions) is that there is, in fact, a scientific consensus on the matter, on the part of the scientists best qualified to have an evidence-backed opinion. No evidence to the contrary has been presented here; all I have seen is assertions. On the other hand, the mere existence of the IPCC report is evidence that such a consensus does exist; how strong that evidence might be is a matter of debate, apparently, but that it does exist and does support the assertion that a consensus exists, and that consensus is that AGW is real, is not.

ETA: and before we go there, the IPCC report is by no means the only such piece of evidence. It is therefore obvious that there are multiple pieces of evidence pointing to the existence of a consensus, and none pointing to its nonexistence. What conclusion is it reasonable to draw in the face of this?

(now off my google-search mode and into personal opinion)

Excellent way to look at the science. Ignore the IPCC, and count the articles from reputable sources, as Varoche brought in, but there are many others.

Rockoon deserves respect, IMHO, for having researched and tried to discuss the actual process by which the IPCC report was generated, and the fact that it does have political inputs.

I am personally much more interested in the suggested actions, which do not necessarily follow from the "consensus conclusion", and on which there is no "consensus of actions". It's in the actions that we can get shafted.