Climate changes

[_honorentheos]

Subby, there is a control; the historical data serves as a control for the modeling. Modeling results using the known data are calibrated to the known results to confirm the models can "predict" what actually occurred.

Following from that, the periods of greatest anthropogenic influence are modelled with natural inputs only and again with anthropogenic inputs. The results that include past human impacts provide more accurate results to what the historic data shows than those with only natural, non-human influences. It clearly shows we've had an impact on the climate to date as a species.

The argument that we can't know that humans have an impact because climate is dynamic is silly.

[_Gunnar]

The argument that we can't know that humans have an impact because climate is dynamic is silly.

So is the often repeated myth that climate scientists can only get government funding for their research if they start out with the presumption that AGW is real and are willing to doctor or cherry pick the data, if necessary, to support that conclusion. Climate scientists don't have any particular reason to prefer that AGW is real, rather than not. They don't want it to be true any more than anyone else does. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2Xyov6Lo1I&list=PL-Xgw8LFaM3CDfmDnZSlcP689P7OlTiYH&index=1

On the other hand, the organizations that are spending literally billions of dollars to convince us that it is a fraud are funded largely by the fossil fuel industry and other groups that have an enormous, vested self-interest in convincing us of that, whether it is true or not.

[_Res Ipsa]

How does showing climate has had greater change in the past then changes in the last cebntury of mankind say mankind is not behind current changes?

It accentuates the lack of a "control" for your argument's scientific assumptions but supports mine as a historical trend.
In other words you have no independent variable regarding today's climate without "industrial age", therefore to implicate that the cause as the "industrial age" is speculative. But - the historical trend has shown deviations in climate, such as temperature, occurring in similar fashion regardless of man's activity and without an "industrial age".
You just have a lack of integrity within your own scientific premises.

So, while you may reasonably state that the climate trends of the past do not dismiss ACM, it is by that same reasoning that it may be stated that it in fact does dismiss ACM....as the video of the OP effectively does.

Complete and utter nonsense. The relationship between CO2 and temperature is established by basic radiative physics. The increasing CO2 is established by direct measurement. The source of the increasing CO2 is established both by inventory of CO2 emissions and analysis of carbon isotopes. The "control" that subby demands is provided by ice cores, which establish that over the last 400,000 the relationship between temperature and CO2 is very highly correlated. Subby wants to ignore the last 400,000 years because he doesn't like what they tell us. He wants to go back further -- when our methods of estimating both temperature and atmospheric CO2 are much less precise and where other factors not present in the last 400,000 years affected the earth/atmosphere system.

Again, the only evidence subby is relying on is a couple of graphs slapped together by a Mining Safety Engineer from West Virginia. That's how denial works. Denialists will scream to the high heavens about how inaccurate our measurement of planetary temperature is today, and then will rely on some guy's slapping together of a couple of graphs for the notion that we can accurately tell the temperature of the planet 500 million years ago. Any data that allows them to argue against market regulation is perfectly reliable to them. They don't give a crap about science -- just their conservative/libertarian economic beliefs.

...

There are 2 valid reasons to discount the links provided:

1. As stated in another post on this thread, the IPCC is a bias source and the integrity of its data and findings are suspect.
2. The "my scientists are better than other scientists - because they confirm my opinion" is not a valid argument.

The video in the OP relies on unbias empirical data and merely puts forth a different, albeit more scientific, conclusion that does not fit the current political narrative - which is one of the more consistent criticisms found among the many "sources" you often cite..

Number 1 is simply BS. It's the kind of reasoning leads to people not getting vaccinated because scientists are biased, or lobbying against GMO foods because scientists are biased, or claiming God created the earth and all present species 6,000 years ago because scientists are biased. Subby is simply dismissing science because of his political beliefs -- that's what denial is.

Number 2 is a straw man. It's not that some scientists are better than others, it's that the work some scientists do is better than others. The repeated studies that show no connection between the MMR vaccine and autism are better studies than Andrew Wakefield's studies. The reason that there is such a high consensus in climate science about global warming is the same reason there is a high consensus among scientists over evolution, vaccination and gmo foods: the science leads people to the same answers. Why would we expect otherwise?

Mainstream climate science is, and has always been, about science. Certain conservative politicians, think tanks, and lobbying groups politicized it because they didn't like the implications of the science. It is people like subby that are operating off of a political narrative -- not climate scientists.

[_Res Ipsa]

Using Goebbels to defend Hitler is hardly convincing, its just incestuous.

This is perhaps the stupidest comment subby has ever made. Let's see: referring to publications by biologists demonstrating the evidence for evolution would be incestuous -- just like using Goebbels to defend Hitler. Referring to publications by medical researchers demonstrating the evidence that vaccines don't cause autism would be incestuous -- just like using Goebbels to defend Hitler. Referring to publications by biologists that demonstrate the evidence for the safety of GMOs would be incestuous -- just like using Goebbels to defend Hitler. Get it? The stronger the evidence, the stronger the consensus and, therefore, the stronger the argument that we can ignore the evidence!!!

The point of the video was basic science whereas it notes how previous "non-industrial" time periods have had fluctuating climates in excess of and divergent from man's activity. This coupled with the larger history of climate changes can only conclude with ACM being a grant-inspired myth.

In other words there is no empirical evidence to support the fact that the climate would not being undergoing its current changes anyway.

Well, yes, if you close your eyes and ears to the best actual evidence, you will conclude there is no evidence. Those of us that can read can go look at the attribution studies and see the evidence that nothing else that causes climate change is changing in a way that explains the recent increase in global temperatures. That's what people who aren't determined to deny an area of science for political reasons call "evidence."

(Your IPCC reference is meanginless and in fact, lacks "certainty":
"In January 2005, Dr. Chris Landsea who had been an author on the 2001 report (TAR), withdrew his participation in the Fourth Assessment Report claiming that the portion of the IPCC to which he contributed had become "politicized" and that the IPCC leadership simply dismissed his concerns."

Yeah, Kevin Trenbreth was a lead author for the FAR and asked Landsea to write the section on Atlantic Hurricanes as he had done for the TAR. During the very active 2008 hurricane season, Landsea and a couple other scientists were telling the press that the hurricane season had nothing to do with global warming. The press was reporting those statements to mean that, because there was no connection, this was evidence against global warming. Some folks at Harvard called a press conference to rebut what was, essentially, misreporting. A bunch of scientists, including Trenbreth, were invited. The press conference was not called by the IPCC and the IPCC did not treat it as representing its views. Trenbreth basically said that global warming is occurring and is affecting ocean temperatures, wind and sea currents, etc, and so it was wrong to say it would have no effect on hurricanes. Landsea got pissed off and complained to the IPCC. The IPCC said something like "when scientists are not speaking on our behalf, we aren't responsible for what they say." Landsea got more pissed off and reneged on his agreement to write the Atlantic Hurricane section of the report.

All this occurred before Landsea had even submitted anything to Trenbreth for the IPCC FAR.

Individual scientists have egos, and sometimes they get into pissing matches. What effect, if any, global warming will have on hurricanes/tropical storms is still a matter of scientific disagreement, as the most recent IPCC report states. Landsea's research is still cited in the IPCC reports, and the IPCC agrees with Landsea's conclusions about trends in the number of Atlantic hurricanes (there are cynical ups and downs, but no evidence of an upward trend.) It's latest report include studies indicating an increase in the strength of tropical storms.

Nothing about Landsea's beef with Trenbreth has anything to do with the IPCC's conclusions that the earth is warming primarily due to human activity. Citing what is really a dispute between two scientists over what both are saying to the press as an excuse to ignore the best survey's of the scientific literature on climate change is just subby's convenient excuse to ignore climate science in favor of some guy on youtube.

A 2008 Report for the US Climate Change Science Program (CCSP) suggested that the IPCC report may have been 'overconfident' with its uncertainty estimate for the total aerosol forcing. This was based on an earlier 2006 paper that elicitated the judgment of twenty-four experts on aerosol forcing. The CCSP Report went on to say:

[...] expert judgment is not a substitute for definitive scientific research. Nor is it a substitute for careful deliberative expert reviews of the literature of the sort undertaken by the IPCC. However, its use within such review processes could enable a better expression of the diversity of expert judgment and allow more formal expression of expert judgments, which are not adequately reflected, in the existing literature. It can also provide insights for policy makers and research planners while research to produce more definitive results is ongoing. It is for these reasons that Moss and Schneider have argued that such elicitations should become a standard input to the IPCC assessment process)

This is a report on potential ways to improve how reports on the climate, including the IPCC reports, handle and communicate uncertainty. The report included sections by various authors with a wide range of suggestions. One suggestion, which is fairly controversial, suggested that the IPCC go beyond its practice of surveying and reporting on the published scientific literature. It suggests the IPCC also survey the opinions of the relevant experts in the field and report the range of their opinions. It used the confidence interval for aerosol forcing as an example, showing that it was narrower than was reflected in a survey of opinions by experts in the field. Frankly, I'm dubious. When it comes to the science, I'm not as interested in Jim Hansen's or Richard LIndzen's opinions about their area of scientific expertise -- I'm interested in the evidence and conclusions that get published in studies subject to peer review and, perhaps more importantly, are subject to post-publication peer review in the literature. It also seems to me there are all kinds of problems inherent in deciding who is an expert and how to weight the opinions of different experts.

Whatever the case, refusing to consider the evidence in the IPCC reports because a report on how to treat uncertainty suggested that a range of uncertainty for aerosols based on a review of the scientific literature was narrower than that derived from the opinions of experts is subby's convenient excuse to ignore the actual science in favor of some guy on youtube who used to be an environmentalist but changed his mind.

On the other hand, maybe he's right. Maybe relying on LDS sources for facts and evidence about the LDS church is incestous and is tantamount to using Goebbels to defend Hitler. Maybe the only credible sources we have are former members and random critics on youtube.

Or maybe subby is just talking out of his ass, as usual.

[_Themis]

I see subby as usual running away when people actually start talking about facts. It's not unexpected from those who know little and have no real interest in the subject to figure out what the facts are. It's one of those issues that gets defined by what the guys they view as the enemy think about it.

[_Some Schmo]

On the other hand, the organizations that are spending literally billions of dollars to convince us that it is a fraud are funded largely by the fossil fuel industry and other groups that have an enormous, vested self-interest in convincing us of that, whether it is true or not.

To me, this is the crux of the matter. Even if scientists were completely split 50/50 on this issue, which side obviously has more to gain/lose?

You have to be a mental midget (or at least, fanatically afraid of the discomfort you anticipate from having to change yours and society's habits) to choose the side of the science deniers.

Here's another thing I don't quite understand about the extreme right these days (not so much to do with climate change, just their overall philosophy): if they think our current situation sucks so much, because, well, Obama, why are they clamoring for the status quo?

[_Gunnar]

Using Goebbels to defend Hitler is hardly convincing, its just incestuous.

This is perhaps the stupidest comment subby has ever made. Let's see: referring to publications by biologists demonstrating the evidence for evolution would be incestuous -- just like using Goebbels to defend Hitler. Referring to publications by medical researchers demonstrating the evidence that vaccines don't cause autism would be incestuous -- just like using Goebbels to defend Hitler. Referring to publications by biologists that demonstrate the evidence for the safety of GMOs would be incestuous -- just like using Goebbels to defend Hitler. Get it? The stronger the evidence, the stronger the consensus and, therefore, the stronger the argument that we can ignore the evidence!!!

I agree! This is just like the Flat Earth Research society arguing that the stronger and more universally accepted the consensus becomes about the roundness of the earth and the helio-centricity of the solar system, the more conclusively this proves both the existence and effectiveness of the evil, scientific and political conspiracy against the truth of the flat earth theory.