Originally Posted by The Rani

Even the worst case scenario isn't actually all that bad.

Worst case scenario is a nuclear war over declining resources. Global warming isn't kept in a hermetically sealed bell jar. It has to share space with lots of other problems.

But I agree it's not anything to freak out about. Just something to do something about. Since we've all agreed on that, it seems to me now we're just bonking on each other over the mental road each of us takes to get there, which is pretty silly.

Unless someone wants to come along and actually say we should go on burning fossil fuels without concern, this thread has probably served its purpose.

Originally Posted by Pink Splice

The chances of anyone prevailing on a climate/global warming/energy discussion (actually, argument/rant), on an internet politics board are worse.

That's true of any subject. But there is a difference between this topic and ones from politics and economics. With the latter people can have honest disagreements depending on their worldview. Just because I think Austrian economics is mostly a lot of horse hockey doesn't mean I can simple assume it is invalid. But when it comes to science worldviews don't have the same stature. One can rule certain views as invalid. It is possible to get correct answers to questions as opposed to a bunch of conflicting opinions (e.g. the story about the one-handed economist).

So when HC says we have to fight them over there or we will fight them over here I might not agree with him, but I cannot say for certain that his statement is incorrect. But when Rani claims that rising CO2 reflects release of CO2 from warming oceans, she is simply incorrect. When Justin claims that climate could be changing because of the Earth's movement through interstellar space is affecting galactic cosmic ray flux, he is simply incorrect. When both assert that climate is chaotic when there is no basis for such an assertion they are inaccurate.

It has been interesting to see that Justin sounds a lot like HC on this issue.

Originally Posted by The Rani

And for being worried about the end of the species, I'm not at all. Even the worst case scenario isn't actually all that bad. I don't know what everyone is having such a freak out about.

Now just who here on this board has said that? You have been discussing this issue with Brian, Bob and me on this board. I have never said that, neither have they.

Originally Posted by Mikebert

TBut when Rani claims that rising CO2 reflects release of CO2 from warming oceans, she is simply incorrect. When Justin claims that climate could be changing because of the Earth's movement through interstellar space is affecting galactic cosmic ray flux, he is simply incorrect. When both assert that climate is chaotic when there is no basis for such an assertion they are inaccurate.

You keep making those claims -- particularly the last one -- as if you don't have to back them up with any evidence at all! Brilliant!

I mean, CO2 levels do rise when oceans warm with the climate; and cosmic ray flux does affect climate. These are experimentally-demonstrated system behaviors...

(and btw, all I was doing -- and I'm guessing that Rani was doing as well -- was pointing out that your assertion of linearity was scientifically unjustified. I know I haven't claimed to know one way or another how climate works. So the only assertion we have to make is that you simply don't know what you claim to know. And so far, what's been passed off as response to that contention tends at least not to seriously undermine it.)
As for assertions of what is... that particular breed of hubris is all on your side...

Originally Posted by Justin'77

You keep making those claims -- particularly the last one -- as if you don't have to back them up with any evidence at all! Brilliant!

I mean, CO2 levels do rise when oceans warm with the climate...

Once again Justin demonstrates his ignorance. Here is what I said

But when Rani claims that rising CO2 reflects release of CO2 from warming oceans, she is simply incorrect

Now to what was I referring? Temperature rises of thousands of years ago, or temperature rises today? Of course I am talking about temperature rises today. Now it is perfectly correct to argue that CO2 rises in the remote past could have reflected concurrent temperature rises. For a fixed inventory of CO2 in the oceans + atmosphere, a rise in temperature will cause a transfer of oceanic CO2 into the atmosphere, resulting in a higher atmospheric CO2 level. Since it is possible that the CO2 inventory was not rapidly changing over the periods of rapid temperature change associated with the end of ice ages, it is reasonable to hypothesize that observed rises in CO2 with rising temperature at these times could reflect net transfer of CO2 from the oceans to the atmosphere.

But this speculation Justin engages in is invalid for the present warming because it is an established fact that dissolved CO2 species in the oceans have risen in recent decades. There has been no net transfer of CO2 from ocean to atmosphere. Rising temperature has not produced a net transfer of oceanic CO2 into the atmosphere causing rising atmospheric CO2. Rising CO2 inventory in the oceans + atmosphere due to anthropogenic CO2 emissions have caused the rise in both oceanic and atmospheric Co2 levels.

Originally Posted by Mike A

When Justin claims that climate could be changing because of the Earth's movement through interstellar space is affecting galactic cosmic ray flux, he is simply incorrect.

...cosmic ray flux does affect climate. These are experimentally-demonstrated system behaviors...

Once again he demonstrates his ignorance. Cosmic rays have not be experimentally demonstrated to affect climate. The SKY experiment shows that varying the amount of ionizing radiation resulting in more ions. Such ions, if they were much larger could serve as cloud condensation nuclei. As Nir Shaviv writes:

Originally Posted by Nir Shaviv

..in many circumstances, it is reasonable to expect that more of the small condensation nuclei would also imply more of the larger cloud condensation nuclei which form the seeds of clouds.

The effect on climate is still assumed. Now I think the cosmic ray model is likely correct (but I am not so ignorant as to say it is an established fact as iis Justin) so I will grant Justin's hypothesis that cosmic rays affect climate. Even so, a changing climate requires changing cosmic rays. Since cosmic rays aren't changing:



climate change cannot be attributed to them.

Originally Posted by Mike A

]When both assert that climate is chaotic when there is no basis for such an assertion they are inaccurate.

(and btw, all I was doing -- and I'm guessing that Rani was doing as well -- was pointing out that your assertion of linearity was scientifically unjustified.

No you weren't. You brought up chaos, not I. You got into the nonlinear vs. linear argument with Brian and Bob. I never said climate was linear. I said climate appears to be linear in it's forcings--a statement you never addressed. Stop misrepresenting what I said.

I know I haven't claimed to know one way or another how climate works.

Sure you have. You have asserted that it is chaotic. You have asserted that cosmic rays are known to impact climate. You have asserted that the idea that rising CO2 today could reflect rising temperatures and not addition of CO2. You have asserted that changes in cosmic ray flux resulting from changes in Earth's position is space could be relevant to current climate change. All these assertions (if accurate) indicate a substantial knowledge of how climate works. The fact that they are all wrong shows that you really have no idea what you are talking about.

Originally Posted by The Rani

Mike, what the fuck??

I can't speak for Mike, and I'm not absolutely sure I am reading Shaviv as he intends to be read, but....

"The reason these gases were blamed are primarily because (1) we expect them to warm and indeed the global temperature increased." I'd add we have good reason to "expect them to warm" as we know Earth emits heat as IR radiation and the greenhouse gasses absorb IR radiation and get warmer in the process. I don't think he is quite claiming 'CO2 is not a greenhouse gas,' not quite, but he is attempting to minimize its importance.

"We don't even know the sign of the anthropogenic climate driving (because of the unknown indirect aerosol effects)" When he goes from "anthropogenic greenhouse gasses" to "anthropogenic climate driving (because of the unknown indirect aerosol effects)" he is potentially including the effects of factory released soot on global dimming. Man is causing both warming and cooling effects. If I'm reading him right, Nir Shaviv is very unusual in suggesting that dimming might be the larger effect.

Unlike Mike, I'll say there is significant evidence for a cosmic ray link to climate change. There have been satellites measuring cloud cover for the last 30 years. There is an observed link between the percentage of cloud cover and the 11 year solar sunspot cycle. However, I agree with Mike that there has been no overall increase in cosmic ray or solar activity in the second half of the 20th Century, just cyclical variations around the same levels reached around 1950. While there is a proposed and reasonably confirmed mechanism for how cosmic rays effect climate -- to some degree supported by lab duplications of the effect as well as observed from space -- the evidence does not suggest that this mechanism is responsible for the warming observed in the second half of the 20th century and continuing since.

But Shaviv's paragraphs seem to be a decent summary of the 'skeptic' position, not too far removed from Justin's position. 1) Mainline science is overestimating the effects of greenhouse gas. 2) Mainline science underestimates the effects of solar or cosmic ray forcing.

The problem with the above sceptic position is that while there was a big jump in solar / cosmic forcing early in the 20th Century, it was stable over the second half. I would agree that a great deal of the early 20th Century warming could be attributable to forcings suggested by Nir Shaviv's comments. Where he takes leave of the evidence is 1950 or so, when solar / cosmic forcing flattened out, while greenhouse gas levels started rising at an increased rate. Shaviv's position requires one to take the entire 20th Century as a single data point. By far most of the climate scientists prefer to look at climate on a more detailed year by year or even continuously modeled basis.

I'd illustrate the point by posting more squiggly lines, but...

***

I'll take one more shot at climate / weather. If one puts a pot of water on the stove, turns up the heat, and wonders how rapidly the pot will heat, one does not need to invoke chaos at all. Energy is going into the pot faster than it is going out. One can use the laws of thermodynamics and basic algebraic equations to generate a chart of temperature against time.

However, heating the bottom of the pot causes the water near the bottom to expand, and thus be lighter than the water at the top. Thus, the warm water at the bottom tries to rise, while the cool water at the top tries to drop. Convection currents will develop, moving hot stuff to cold places and vice versa. If you care about how much warmer the bottom will be than at the top, or the speed and location of the various currents, and how it all changes as one puts heat into the system, this is a much more complex task that will involve chaos.

But the presence of these currents and temperature variations does not invalidate the simpler thermodynamic perspective. The presence of these currents and temperature variations does not mean conservation of energy goes away. The average temperature of the water (climate) can be calculated much more simply than a detailed description that includes every small variation in the system (weather).

Originally Posted by Mikebert

The presence of sizable warming today despite the absence of a sizable solar effect is puzzling until you note that the largest CO2 effect in thousands of years just happens to be going on at the same time as the puzzling warming. Not only that, but the CO2 rise is of sufficient size to produce the warming observed. I call that means and [/i]opportunity[/i].

I'd push the analogy a bit further. Measuring CO2 heating in the lab in the presence of IR radiation, and measuring the increasing CO2 levels in the atmosphere during the observed 'unexplained' warming seems to me the equivalent of placing the accused at the scene of the crime and finding fingerprints on the murder weapon.

Originally Posted by The Rani

Mike, what the fuck?? Following your "Nir Shaviv" link brought me to this passage:

"As explained above, there is no real direct evidence which can be used to incriminate anthropogenic greenhouse gases as the being the main factor responsible for the observed global warming. The reason these gases were blamed are primarily because (1) we expect them to warm and indeed the global temperature increased, and (2) there is no other mechanism which can explain the warming.

"Although this reasoning seems logical, it turns out that (1) We don't even know the sign of the anthropogenic climate driving (because of the unknown indirect aerosol effects), and (2) There is an alternative mechanism which can explain a large part of the warming.

"Solar activity can explain a large part of the 20th century global warming, on condition that there is a strong solar/climate link through modulation of the cosmic ray flux and the atmospheric ionization. Evidence for such a link has been accumulating over the past decade, and by now, it is unlikely that it does not exist.

"This link also implies that Earth's global temperature sensitivity is also on the low side. Thus, if we double the amount of CO2 by 2100, we will only increase the temperature by about 1°C or so. This is still more than the change over the past century. This is good news, because it implies that future increases in the amount of atmospheric greenhouse gases will not dramatically increase the global temperature, though GHGs will probably be the dominate climate driver."

The models I have presented are pretty much in accordance with Dr. Shaviv's views. The formula I gave using lambda = 0.3 gives 1.1 C for a doubling of CO2. By the end of the century under present trends CO2 will roughly triple giving the 2C lower end of the prediction I gave. I also have solar activity making up more than half of the 20th century warming (Shaviv says two-thirds).

The fact that you think what he says contradicts what I have been saying shows that he, as a skeptic, has a spin of his own. For the most part we are pretty much on the same page.

Dr. Shaviv and I do disagree about recent warming. I look at direct cosmic ray measurements, the proxy data he used for this paleo work, and common solar activity measures and see little change in solar activity/cosmic rays over the past 50 years compared to the 50 years before that. Thus, I think solar factors were largely responsible to the temperature rise to mid-century, but that CO2 is mostly responsible for the rise since the 1970's.

He thinks solar factors are still important now and based on them predicts cooling in this decade. I think CO2 is more important and so believe it will warm more. So far cooling hasn't happened.

The cosmic ray model is precisely what has caused me to believe that there was something to this global warming business. Rather than support the skeptic view, it demolishes it, in my view. By providing an explanation for early 20th century warming and the ice ages--neither of which can convincingly be explained (at least to me) by CO2, it shows that climatic swings can be largely explained by the action of a relatively few variables. That is, we do have a good handle on this thing.

The presence of sizable warming today despite the absence of a sizable solar effect is puzzling until you note that the largest CO2 effect in thousands of years just happens to be going on at the same time as the puzzling warming. Not only that, but the CO2 rise is of sufficient size to produce the warming observed. I call that means and opportunity.

Yes, the case is based on circumstantial evidence. So what? One can convict on circumstantial evidence. In cases built on such evidence, lawyers sometimes will inject red herrings as "alternative theories of the crime" to convince juries to let their clients off. Similarly, GW skeptics like to push the circumstantial aspect and introduce red herrings into the discussion. But this doesn't make their case. They need to provide some evidence for their views on recent warming. They have not.

Originally Posted by Bob Butler 54

I'm not absolutely sure I am reading Shaviv as he intends to be read, but....

"The reason these gases were blamed are primarily because (1) we expect them to warm and indeed the global temperature increased." I'd add we have good reason to "expect them to warm" as we know Earth emits heat as IR radiation and the greenhouse gasses absorb IR radiation and get warmer in the process. I don't think he is quite claiming 'CO2 is not a greenhouse gas,' not quite, but he is attempting to minimize its importance.

No he's not. He fully accepts that CO2 is a greenhouse gas and that it produces warming. That is, it is a suspect in producing current warming. This suspect has both means and opportunity to "do the deed".

"We don't even know the sign of the anthropogenic climate driving (because of the unknown indirect aerosol effects)" When he goes from "anthropogenic greenhouse gasses" to "anthropogenic climate driving (because of the unknown indirect aerosol effects)" he is potentially including the effects of factory released soot on global dimming. Man is causing both warming and cooling effects. If I'm reading him right, Nir Shaviv is very unusual in suggesting that dimming might be the larger effect.

Yes, he suggests that it is possible that human aerosol effects could outweigh CO2. He considers this unlikely.

Unlike Mike, I'll say there is significant evidence for a cosmic ray link to climate change.

I believe the cosmic ray hypothesis is true. However it has not been established experimentally yet, as Justin asserted. Experimental evidence supporing the link has been obtained. But so far nobody has shown radiation inducing the formation of the larger particles that serve as condensation nuclei. Ions are too small. In time I think they will establish that the effect is real.

However, I agree with Mike that there has been no overall increase in cosmic ray or solar activity in the second half of the 20th Century, just cyclical variations around the same levels reached around 1950.

This of course is the key issue. It establishes that solar activity was not at the scene of the crime. Thus although solar has the means, its lacked the opportunity to do the deed.

Given this fact, introducing anthropogenic aerosols is a red herring. What this does is create warming that isn't explained by anything known. But the warming is there. So asserting a potentially large aerosol effect is simultaneously asserting the presence of another suspect at the crime scene. There is no evidence of this suspect's presence in the past temperature record (solar alone can explain most of the real fluctuations of the past and CO2 was at most a minor player). This mystery man is invoked today because skeptics have a fluctuation that they cannot blame on solar and don't want to consider CO2.

But Shaviv's paragraphs seem to be a decent summary of the 'skeptic' position, not too far removed from Justin's position. 1) Mainline science is overestimating the effects of greenhouse gas. 2) Mainline science underestimates the effects of solar or cosmic ray forcing.

No Shiv's position is different from Justin's. Shaviv says that CO2 will be the dominant warming in this century. His predicted warming falls into my prediction. Shaviv favors reducing CO2 emissions, he just believes that other factors (like the fact that much of the oil is possessed by nasty Muslim regimes) are more important.

I'll take one more shot at climate / weather. If one puts a pot of water on the stove, turns up the heat, and wonders how rapidly the pot will heat, one does not need to invoke chaos at all. Energy is going into the pot faster than it is going out. One can use the laws of thermodynamics and basic algebraic equations to generate a chart of temperature against time.

However, heating the bottom of the pot causes the water near the bottom to expand, and thus be lighter than the water at the top. Thus, the warm water at the bottom tries to rise, while the cool water at the top tries to drop. Convection currents will develop, moving hot stuff to cold places and vice versa. If you care about how much warmer the bottom will be than at the top, or the speed and location of the various currents, and how it all changes as one puts heat into the system, this is a much more complex task that will involve chaos.

But the presence of these currents and temperature variations does not invalidate the simpler thermodynamic perspective. The presence of these currents and temperature variations does not mean conservation of energy goes away. The average temperature of the water (climate) can be calculated much more simply than a detailed description that includes every small variation in the system (weather).

This is an excellent analogy. Good job.

Originally Posted by Mikebert

This is an excellent analogy. Good job.

Appreciated, though it doesn't quite explain why the watched pot doesn't boil, or how I could have responded to your post 822 in my post 821.

http://news.independent.co.uk/enviro...cle2556466.ece

Earth's natural defences against climate change 'beginning to fail'

By Michael McCarthy, Environment Editor

Published: 18 May 2007



The earth's ability to soak up the gases causing global warming is beginning to fail because of rising temperatures, in a long-feared sign of "positive feedback," new research reveals today.

Climate change itself is weakening one of the principal "sinks" absorbing carbon dioxide - the Southern Ocean around Antarctica - a new study has found.

As a result, atmospheric CO2 levels may rise faster and bring about rising temperatures more quickly than previously anticipated. Stabilising the CO2 level, which must be done to bring the warming under control, is likely to become much more difficult, even if the world community agrees to do it.

The news may give added urgency to the meeting in three weeks' time between the G8 group of rich nations and the leading developing countries led by China, at Heiligendamm in Germany, when an attempt will be made to put together the framework of a new world climate treaty to succeed the current Kyoto protocol.

"This is a timely warning in advance of Heiligendamm and the G8 that the climate clock is beginning to tick faster," said the leading environmentalist Tom Burke, visiting professor at Imperial College London.

"The shift that has been detected in a four-year study by researchers from the University of East Anglia, the British Antarctic Survey and the Max-Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, published in the journal Science, is one of the most ominous in the development of climate change. It implies a breach in the planet's own defences against global warming.

Human society has hugely benefited from the earth's natural carbon absorption facility, which means oceans and forests take up roughly half of the CO2 pumped into the atmosphere, in the so-called carbon cycle. What is left in the atmosphere is known as the "airborne fraction".

If sinks weakened, the airborne fraction would be likely to get bigger. Although supercomputer models of the climate have for some time predicted the weakening of the ocean and terrestrial sinks, no example of it happening has actually been detected - until now.

Now the research team has found the vast Southern Ocean, which is the earth's biggest carbon sink, accounting for about 15 per cent of the total absorption potential, has become effectively CO2-saturated.

The level of the gas it is absorbing has remained static since 1981 - but in that time the amount emitted has grown by 40 per cent, so it has stopped keeping pace and much more CO2 is left over to trap the sun's heat.

The effect - revealed by scrutinising observations of atmospheric CO2 from 40 stations around the world, is thought to have been caused by an increase in ocean wind speeds. Stormier weather and stronger waves are churning up the sea and bringing natural CO2 stored there closer to the surface - which reduces the ability of the surface to absorb the gas from the air.

The increased winds are believed to be caused by altered atmospheric temperature regimes produced by two separate processes - the depletion of the ozone layer over Antarctica by chlorofluorocarbon gases from aerosol spray cans (now phased out), and global warming.

It is thus a positive feedback - an effect of climate change which itself makes climate change worse. Some researchers fear that feedbacks may make global warming happen much faster, and harder to control, than generally appreciated. The pessimism of scientists such as James Lovelock is largely based on the fact that most feedbacks in the earth's system are likely to work against us.

"This is the first unequivocal detection of a carbon sink weakening because of recent climate change," said the lead author of the study, Corinne Le Quéré, of the University of East Anglia. "This is serious. Whenever the world has greatly warmed in the past, the weakening of CO2 sinks has contributed to it."

Professor Chris Rapley, director of the British Antarctic Survey, said: "Since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution the world's oceans have absorbed about a quarter of the 500 gigatons [millions of tonnes] of carbon emitted by humans. The possibility that in a warmer world the Southern Ocean is weakening is a cause for concern."

The Government's chief scientific adviser, Sir David King, said: "We have quite a large number of positive feedbacks to worry about, and this appears to be another one. But the seriousness of it would depend on if it was affecting the whole ocean, or merely the Southern Ocean."

In recent years it has become clear that the rate at which CO2 was accumulating is itself increasing. The level currently stands at about 382 parts per million by volume (ppm), up from 315 ppm in 1958.

In the past decade the rate has jumped from about 1.6ppm annually to well above 2ppm - a fact which, as The Independent reported in October 2004, may well signal that the earth's absorption ability is shrinking.

Asked if this rate increase could now be linked to weakening sinks, Dr Le Quéré said: "I think we are just at the border of detecting that." She added: "All the carbon cycle experts have their eyes on it."

Originally Posted by Odin

http://news.independent.co.uk/enviro...cle2556466.ece

The earth's ability to soak up the gases causing global warming is beginning to fail because of rising temperatures, in a long-feared sign of "positive feedback," new research reveals today.

OK, so what do we do about it? Is there any indication that even a 110% reduction in CO2 emissions will do anything to reverse this??

Originally Posted by Odin

http://news.independent.co.uk/enviro...cle2556466.ece

This article doesn't make sense. As CO2 levels in the atmosphere rise the oceans should be able to sorb more CO2, unless the pH has dropped dramatically. What I've read is pH has dropped only about 0.1 unit since excess CO2 started to be absorbed.

Originally Posted by Mikebert

This article doesn't make sense. As CO2 levels in the atmosphere rise the oceans should be able to sorb more CO2, unless the pH has dropped dramatically. What I've read is pH has dropped only about 0.1 unit since excess CO2 started to be absorbed.

I went to visit Science magazine to see if I could get a look at the original article. I got as far as the table of contents for this week and last week, and found nothing to match the press release quoted at the top of the page.

I did see many other press organizations repeating similar reviews of the Science article... just can't find the Science article. Are there two journals named 'Science?'

In bumbling around the net, I did stumble onto a skeptical paper in a reviewed journal, and a rebuttal printed in the same journal. The rebuttal ended with a scold that the journal had not done an adequate job of peer review on the original paper.

At any rate, the authors are going around many of the same circles we have been, in a slightly more professional manner.

The question I would like to ask is what measures we will need to take to stop further emissions of greenhouse gases and get greenhouse gas levels back to pre-industrial levels. Firstly we would need to identify what are the main sources of greenhouse gases going into the atmosphere.

http://www.umich.edu/~gs265/society/greenhouse.htm This page gives a good overview of the sources of human created greenhouse gases.

Originally Posted by Tristan

The question I would like to ask is what measures we will need to take to stop further emissions of greenhouse gases and get greenhouse gas levels back to pre-industrial levels. Firstly we would need to identify what are the main sources of greenhouse gases going into the atmosphere.

It may come to pass that fizzy beverages are to blame. They have widened our posteriors even as they fever the orb we live upon. Psalm 23:2 ...leadeth me beside the still waters. might convince us to use non-carbonated drinks; but 23:5 is problematic as it allows for a certain excess in the use of resources with its ...my cup runneth over.

Originally Posted by Virgil K. Saari

It may come to pass that fizzy beverages are to blame. They have widened our posteriors

Yes they have, or in my case did. When my parents first moved us to the south, we lived near an RC Cola bottiling plant. They used to buy us cases of the stuff to drink. I gained 30 pounds in one year. Thank God I had a growth spurt right after that and grew six inches taller. Discovering sports also helped get me back into shape.

Today I can't stand the taste of RC. I literally burned out on it at the age of nine. So, if my cup does runneth over, it won't be from carbonated beveraes.

Originally Posted by Virgil K. Saari

It may come to pass that fizzy beverages are to blame. They have widened our posteriors even as they fever the orb we live upon. Psalm 23:2 ...leadeth me beside the still waters. might convince us to use non-carbonated drinks; but 23:5 is problematic as it allows for a certain excess in the use of resources with its ...my cup runneth over.

:: Looks at label on club soda::

Nutrition Facts
Serving Size : 240 ml
Servings per container : about 8

Total Fat 0%
Sodium 0%
Total carbohydrates 0g, 0%
Protein 0g

Calories 0.

No widened posterior here. As for the CO2 , my guess is that I consume more club soda whilst mingling with the kingdom of plantae , all club soda does is nourish the grass or pecan trees with a little boost of CO2.

As far as Bible verses, I prefer this one.

Ecclesiastes 2:4-6 (New International Version)


4 I undertook great projects: I built houses for myself and planted vineyards. 5 I made gardens and parks and planted all kinds of fruit trees in them. 6 I made reservoirs to water groves of flourishing trees. (by exhaling the CO2 from club soda, amongst other things.

Originally Posted by Bob Butler 54

In bumbling around the net, I did stumble onto a skeptical paper in a reviewed journal, and a rebuttal printed in the same journal. The rebuttal ended with a scold that the journal had not done an adequate job of peer review on the original paper.

At any rate, the authors are going around many of the same circles we have been, in a slightly more professional manner.

This paper is pretty bad. If these guys are faculty it reflects rather poorly on their department.

I don't mean that the paper is written poorly, just that the thinking about the problem is sloppy--not dissimilar to that of Lord Monckton or Justin. But Justin is arguing and Monckton is writing political statements about GW (their thinking is informed by their politics, not their grasp of science). In a world where we are supposed to take seriously the idea that Saddam was getting nukes and was in league with al Qaeda, Monckton's and Justin's thinking is pretty damn good.

But these guys are supposedly writing for a technical audience. How could it not occur to them that their silliness would not be immediately seen for what it was? Unless the civil engineers really are a few steps below Chem E's.

Originally Posted by Zarathustra

I get conflicting information on that. I've seen what you've said, usually quoted by those who debunk GW. And I've seen it said, more often, that what we have going on now is already significantly higher than anything seen in the Medieval Warm Period. The latter is typical of GW alerters.

How is one to figure this all out?

Here is an interesting fact about grapes in England. People who say the Medieval Warm period was warmer than today, cite that grapes were grown in England back then.

However today grapes and quite good wine can be grown in Southern England from Ely River in East to Severn in the West, which is exactly the same region of England vineyards were recorded in the Domesday book.

Originally Posted by Tristan

Here is an interesting fact about grapes in England. People who say the Medieval Warm period was warmer than today, cite that grapes were grown in England back then.

However today grapes and quite good wine can be grown in Southern England from Ely River in East to Severn in the West, which is exactly the same region of England vineyards were recorded in the Domesday book.

I just keep going back to the "squiggly lines," which the so called 'skeptics' disregard. CO2 emissions really took off after 1950, and so did the temperature. The modern warm period pretty well matched the medieval warm period at 1950, but since then the temperature continued going up. Solar forcing has been essentially steady since 1950, but greenhouse gas emissions and temperature have soared.

One can attempt to get technical, but the bottom line is that more CO2 has resulted in higher temperatures.

Originally Posted by Bob Butler 54

I just keep going back to the "squiggly lines," which the so called 'skeptics' disregard. CO2 emissions really took off after 1950, and so did the temperature. The modern warm period pretty well matched the medieval warm period at 1950, but since then the temperature continued going up. Solar forcing has been essentially steady since 1950, but greenhouse gas emissions and temperature have soared.

One can attempt to get technical, but the bottom line is that more CO2 has resulted in higher temperatures.

Ah yes. Good old post hoc. How I've missed you.

Even though you're not even demonstrably post in this scenario, it's still good to see an old acquaintance.

Originally Posted by Justin '77

Ah yes. Good old post hoc. How I've missed you.

Now this is a Bushism. Really Justin.

The post hoc fallacy is to assume that just because B follows A doesn't mean that A causes B. It is used when there is no reason to believe that A and B are causally connected. It is a known fact that rising CO2 will produce higher temperatures, ceteris paribus. Thus, a correspondence in timing (i.e. the warming accompanying or following the rising CO2 as opposed to preceding it) IS valid evidence in favor of a role of CO2 in warming.