WSJ: Whatever Happened to Global Warming?

[FollowChrist34]

Perhaps you should read what people actually post and not play with strawmen.

Skeptics believe CO2 is a GHG but they have serious questions about the validity of the climate models that have failed to pass the scientific method.

Yes, one of my greatest fears about this encyclical is that science will move on from where it stands on this issue now. We have already gone from global warming to climate change largely I believe because of the stagnant numbers on temperatures for the last 20 years. (“hiatus”) Why is it so hard just to admit we don’t understand what is happening? Again, I am all for environmental protection, so, for me, the net result of the encyclical is a big plus. But I question how it will look twenty or fifty years from now. Who knows, maybe the scientific community nailed it this one time. I doubt it though.

 

[LeafByNiggle]

Perhaps you should read what people actually post and not play with strawmen.

Skeptics believe CO2 is a GHG but they have serious questions about the validity of the climate models that have failed to pass the scientific method.

You should read what your fellow skeptics say on this forum. Very few of them admit what you just admitted. Most outright claim that CO2 has no effect on climate.

 

[kbachler]

Sorry, the encyclical added nothing to the debate.

By the way, how’s the view from the high horse?

The encyclical didn’t need to add anything because the debate is already settled. It simply clarified what is already known.

The view is fine. But I would note that I simply pointed out people should be more open, and take more time to understand the information.

 

[kbachler]

Perhaps you should read what people actually post and not play with strawmen.

Skeptics believe CO2 is a GHG but they have serious questions about the validity of the climate models that have failed to pass the scientific method.

LOL. You aren’t serious, right? The models test well, and continue to test better. Further, in a case like this, we can’t use a pure scientific method. The argument has to be more statistical because there isn’t another Earth that we can use as a control group.

There were no straw men here, since there was no argument advanced other than people should be open to learning more about the situation. Perhaps you don’t understand the meaning of “straw man”?

 

[kbachler]

Another other thought: the temperature maximum of 1998 is in fact not the reference point. The warming hiatus actually extends back to the end of 1996, which means that even including the exceptionally strong El Niño event the Earth’s surface temperature has not warmed in 18 and a half years.

Regarding the belief that temperatures are creeping up slowly, there (again) is in fact no statistically meaningful change in temperature, and even if there was it is nothing like the increase predicted by virtually every climate model. The deviation between prediction and fact increases monthly, to the point where even those who firmly believe in AGW recognize that unless warming resumes in the next year or two the models will have to be rejected as unusable.

Ender

The historical record shows that warming hiatuses of 10-18 years are not uncommon events. Even if there were a hiatus, the impact of what has already happened is significant.

Moreover - the “hiatus” is not a hiatus per se - in much the same way that Federal “budget cuts” normally aren’t. Global warming has not stopped. It has simply increased more slowly in the last roughly 15-ish years.

One item that should be kept in mind is that based on normal environmental cycles, the Earth should be in a cooling period. It should be heading toward an ice age. The fact that its warming - even if slower during the last 15 years - is still significant - in an undesirable direction.

And finally, the “hiatus” is not a hiatus of total global energy increase, since ocean energy increase is signficant.

Global warming coincides well with advances in agricultural and industrial output - both of which increase greenhouse gases. The process returns to the atmosphere gases that were once there but that were pulled out by plants millions of years ago. During that period, the Earth was warmer. It could be a significant coincidence.

But we can play an old game with that. It’s called big mistake and small mistake. You play it by considering the upsides and the downsides.

If we change our ways of doing things to be cleaner, we spend a great deal of money to have a cleaner Earth, and environmentally friendly energy and food production. It will create economic stress. People will in the short-term likely be less wealthy.

If there isn’t global warming, then some or much of that effort will be a waste - but at least we will still have a cleaner Earth and renewable energy.

If there is global warming - and we do nothing - then coastal areas will flood, there will be violent storms and food shortages, mass extinctions will occur, and mankind will be greatly harmed.

Which is the big mistake, and which is the small mistake?

Do we fully understand climate? No. Do we fully understand climate change? No. How many of us fully understand things that we accept as valid every day? But what I do understand is that the impact of climate change can continue to grow long after the causes are stopped.

 

[sps49]

LOL. You aren’t serious, right? The models test well, and continue to test better. Further, in a case like this, we can’t use a pure scientific method. The argument has to be more statistical because there isn’t another Earth that we can use as a control group…

Please. The “models” have no objective validation and verification standards, no specifications from which an objective comparison may be made, it all subjective-objective expert review, which changes expert to expert. Testing well only means that they satisfied an expectation, not a standard.

Whining that it’s difficult only wastes energy that could be better used to make the models actually objectively testable. Why should climate models get a pass on this when applied engineering and physics do not? It’s their own fault, really. Once it became political, they became fair game for critical review. De-couple it politically, and few would object to their methods.

 

[kbachler]

Please. The “models” have no objective validation and verification standards, no specifications from which an objective comparison may be made, it all subjective-objective expert review, which changes expert to expert. Testing well only means that they satisfied an expectation, not a standard.

Whining that it’s difficult only wastes energy that could be better used to make the models actually objectively testable. Why should climate models get a pass on this when applied engineering and physics do not? It’s their own fault, really. Once it became political, they became fair game for critical review. De-couple it politically, and few would object to their methods.

It’s not whining. It’s understanding the shortcomings under the circumstance. One can build and test a bridge. One can have a control group in a study. That’s why climate models get a “pass”. The stakes are very high, and long term, and the impact is slow to change - that’s why the models get a “pass”.

One doesn’t have an opportunity to use a strict scientific model with a global issue, so the best we can do is guess and fix. But guess and fix isn’t a bad method - its just not the best method. However, the best method isn’t available under the circumstance.

I recall how for years tobacco companies complained that there was no direct evidence that cigarettes cause cancer. That’s true - and still true today. People use to believe that argument, and would argue that the researchers hadn’t proven the cancer risk.

But the circumstantial evidence is sufficient, as it is in climate changes. And with the high stakes, the expected value clearly weighs with climate change (just as Pascal’s wager weighs with God.)

A lot of people died because they didn’t understand the expected value of the lung cancer argument.

Are you arguing that the best course is to repeat that error?

The models DO have objective verification against historical changes in greenhouse gasses, and historical changes in air temperature and historical changes in Earth energy over time. And that objective verification all provides a circumstantial argument for man made climate change.

 

[Ender]

The models DO have objective verification against historical changes in greenhouse gasses, and historical changes in air temperature and historical changes in Earth energy over time. And that objective verification all provides a circumstantial argument for man made climate change.

The models are bad and monthly diverge ever further from reality, a problem even those who believe in AGW have acknowledged.*If things continue as they have been, in five years, at the latest, we will need to acknowledge that something is fundamentally wrong with our climate models. A 20-year pause in global warming does not occur in a single modeled scenario. But even today, we are finding it very difficult to reconcile actual temperature trends with our expectations. *(Hans von Storch, 2013)
Ender