Global cooling

[Ear]

I usually shy away from government reports since they are so apt to lie, but this isn't quite official -- Sen. Inhofe's excellent A Skeptics Guide to Debunking Global Warming Alarmism, Hot & Cold Media Spin Cycle: A Challenge to Journalists who Cover Global Warming

Senator Inhofe isn't a scientist, he has a vested interest in protecting his corporate backers from any legislation that might hurt their profits, and his frothings have repeatedly been debunked (see references to MONCKTON and HOCKEY STICK in this very thread for more information).  Nature, a respected peer-reviewed scientific journal, published an article about him entitled CLIMATE RESEARCH OPPONENT IS NOT A FRIEND TO SCIENCE.  Inhofe has been known to cherry-pick his "expert" witnesses, which include people like science fiction writers and discredited pseudoscientists.

Senators are not scientists, and the reports they make regarding science are no better than those that appear in the popular media.

[Ear]

Wasn't it Galileo who was heavily criticized and rebuked by his peers?  ???

Among others, some of whom did not survive. Galileo was only sentenced to life imprisonment for heresy when he challenged the popular scientific orthodoxy of his time.

That's pretty heavily misleading, since "scientific orthodoxy" at the time was dictated by the Church, and not by peer review.

[KurtDaBear]

Wasn't it Galileo who was heavily criticized and rebuked by his peers?  ???

Among others, some of whom did not survive. Galileo was only sentenced to life imprisonment for heresy when he challenged the popular scientific orthodoxy of his time.

That's pretty heavily misleading, since "scientific orthodoxy" at the time was dictated by the Church, and not by peer review.

And today it's dictated by corporations and the government.  Scientific orthodoxy is scientific orthodoxy. 

Also, rather than just condemning it out of hand as "not scientific," I took a quick scan of the Imhof item, and one of the first things I came across was a letter from 60 leading Canadian scientists to the Canadian prime minister explaining why they believe global warming is a crock, along with quotes from a leading international believer in man-caused global warming explaining why he was repudiating his previous positions and leaving the global-warming camp (No peer reviews, unfortunately, just the words of the 61 scientists themselves).

You seem to be a bit overly fixated on the method rather than the message.  Many of the world's greatest archeological discoveries have been made by amateurs because the professional experts of their day did not have the imagination or determination to find buried wonders (Troy, for instance).  The fact they were unearthed by amateurs with no scientific credentials does not mean they don't exist.

[FrankChodorov]

Senators are not scientists

surprise - they are politicians...

do not dispair - global warming will become the cigarette smoking "smokescreen" over the next decade.

[Ear]

Wasn't it Galileo who was heavily criticized and rebuked by his peers?  ???

Among others, some of whom did not survive. Galileo was only sentenced to life imprisonment for heresy when he challenged the popular scientific orthodoxy of his time.

That's pretty heavily misleading, since "scientific orthodoxy" at the time was dictated by the Church, and not by peer review.

And today it's dictated by corporations and the government.  Scientific orthodoxy is scientific orthodoxy.

No, it's dictated by PEER REVIEW. 

Also, rather than just condemning it out of hand as "not scientific," I took a quick scan of the Imhof item, and one of the first things I came across was a letter from 60 leading Canadian scientists to the Canadian prime minister explaining why they believe global warming is a crock, along with quotes from a leading international believer in man-caused global warming explaining why he was repudiating his previous positions and leaving the global-warming camp (No peer reviews, unfortunately, just the words of the 61 scientists themselves).

You seem to be a bit overly fixated on the method rather than the message.  Many of the world's greatest archeological discoveries have been made by amateurs because the professional experts of their day did not have the imagination or determination to find buried wonders (Troy, for instance).  The fact they were unearthed by amateurs with no scientific credentials does not mean they don't exist.

Archaeology is not climatology, and the difference is that anyone with a shovel can make an important find in the former, while it requires a good grounding in the relevant scientific disciplines to make a discovery in the latter.  Finds made by amateurs are not exempt from review, although it can't be called "peer review" when the find is made by an amateur who is not a scientist.

Your friend the Senator has repeatedly been discredited in peer-reviewed journals, without any split between scientists on the matter.  The report you cited can have all the unsubstantiated letters you like in it; it also has a lot of bad science and outright lies that have been thoroughly debunked.  Among those are the various "hockey stick" myths; the myth that the conclusions are based solely on research done by Michael Mann and his colleagues, etc.  See my earlier post on these very myths, which Sen. Inhofe BEGINS his article by asserting... and he's a POLITICIAN, so your readiness to hang on his every word as though it were gospel truth is highly inconsistent with what I assume your political beliefs must be, since you are a participant in this forum.

This conversation keeps going in a circle, along the following lines:

    ME: The popular media and government reports by non-scientists are full of propaganda.  Peer-reviewed
    scientific journals show no controversy regarding the facts that global warming is a real phenomenon,
    that it is probably caused by human activity, and that sea levels will probably rise dramatically within
    the next 100 years.

    YOU: But you can't be right, because I found this report in the popular media and this government
    report by a non-scientist that says you're wrong!

Cease and desist your foolishness.  If you want to nay-say me, show me a recent article in a peer-reviewed scientific journal, along with the rebuttals submitted by other scientists, that show that what you're saying isn't bullshit... not bullshit popular media bullshit, or bullshit government bullshit reports on bullshit.

[Ear]

Senators are not scientists

surprise - they are politicians...

do not dispair - global warming will become the cigarette smoking "smokescreen" over the next decade.

Frank, the reason that this issue concerns me so much is that it is so heavily politicized.  I am vehemently and potentially violently opposed to the idea of a world government putting its heavy hand on my back and yours in the name of environmentalism... and I am also vehemently and potentially violently opposed to allowing big corporations to continue pumping carbon into the atmosphere with gay abandon if, in fact, it means the sea levels are going to rise significantly because of it.  The way I see it, it is imperative that we sort out the facts from the fiction, and prepare accordingly so that neither totalitarianism nor unfettered corporatism can use the issue as leverage with which to promote their own hidden (and unrelated to actual fact and possible environmental catastrophe) agenda... but so many people seem to latch onto whatever position benefits them the most, and they pick and choose the propaganda they want to believe accordingly, just like religious zealots choose the faith-based beliefs that please them the most.

All I am asking for is that people ignore the popular media, the government reports, the letters to the editor, etc. and rely on peer-reviewed scientific journals for information that might help them form an opinion of their own.

[FSPinNY]

And then we've got to sort out which scientists have been influenced by corporate money and agenda and government money and agenda. Whew!  I'm buying on higher ground.

[Ear]

And then we've got to sort out which scientists have been influenced by corporate money and agenda and government money and agenda.

In the popular media and the government reports, yes we do.  In the scientific journals, we don't, because that's the job of other scientists and is part of what peer review is all about... and the scientific community does a pretty good job of that, which is why science has advanced so very rapidly since the rise of the scientific method.

Whew!  I'm buying on higher ground.

Don't get too alarmed... as long as you're at least twenty feet above sea level, you're beyond the reach of the very worst-case scenarios being looked at today.  And besides, even if the rise is that dramatic, most scientists are saying that it could take as long as a thousand years to happen, although it could also be within a hundred years.

The hard data that Al Gore presents in AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH is actually pretty good, solid data, as it turns out... but the conclusions he comes to are a little over the top, and show the absolute worst-case scenario on a timeline that is at least twice as fast as any real scientists are currently predicting.

[KBCraig]

No, it's dictated by PEER REVIEW. 

Peers of a feather flock together.

[FSPinNY]

It still seems obvious that the results would tend, more often than not, to follow the money. Even in peer review.  I think if we could eliminate the funding by force (taxpayer/gov $), the research playing field would level out a great deal.

[Ear]

No, it's dictated by PEER REVIEW. 

Peers of a feather flock together.

If you're trying to say that peer-reviewed journals have some mechanism by which they exclude peers who do not agree with the approved dogma, then you're mistaken.  These are not publications that rely on opinion, or dogma.  In order to publish or rebut, hard data and checkable calculations must be included.

[DC]

And besides, even if the rise is that dramatic, most scientists are saying that it could take as long as a thousand years to happen, although it could also be within a hundred years.

So these peer review scientist can't do any better than within a hundred years or a thousand years and that is a mabe. Looks like their grant money is safe because for the next 1000 years they can just say it hasn't happened yet. I do find the 1000 year chart with co2 levels and the teperatures very interesting and something I would like to reseach. If the chart is true and the co2 levels and temperatures are truly what they show on the graph, then unless we are taking large amounts of co2 out of the air ( not just reducing the amount we put into the air)  then we arn't going to accomplish much of anything because our fate has allready been decided.

[Braddogg]

On the Drudge Report front page:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/12/10/nclimate10.xml

UN downgrades man's impact on the climate

Richard Gray, Science Correspondent, Sunday Telegraph

Mankind has had less effect on global warming than previously supposed, a United Nations report on climate change will claim next year.

The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says there can be little doubt that humans are responsible for warming the planet, but the organisation has reduced its overall estimate of this effect by 25 per cent.

In a final draft of its fourth assessment report, to be published in February, the panel reports that the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has accelerated in the past five years. It also predicts that temperatures will rise by up to 4.5 C during the next 100 years, bringing more frequent heat waves and storms.

The panel, however, has lowered predictions of how much sea levels will rise in comparison with its last report in 2001.

Climate change sceptics are expected to seize on the revised figures as evidence that action to combat global warming is less urgent.

Scientists insist that the lower estimates for sea levels and the human impact on global warming are simply a refinement due to better data on how climate works rather than a reduction in the risk posed by global warming.

One leading UK climate scientist, who asked not to be named due to the sensitivity surrounding the report before it is published, said: "The bottom line is that the climate is still warming while our greenhouse gas emissions have accelerated, so we are storing up problems for ourselves in the future."

The IPCC report, seen by The Sunday Telegraph, has been handed to the Government for review before publication.

It warns that carbon dioxide emissions have risen during the past five years by three per cent, well above the 0.4 per cent a year average of the previous two decades. The authors also state that the climate is almost certain to warm by at least 1.5 C during the next 100 years.

Such a rise would be enough to take average summer temperatures in Britain to those seen during the 2003 heatwave, when August temperatures reached a record-breaking 38 C. Unseasonable warmth this year has left many Alpine resorts without snow by the time the ski season started.

Britain can expect more storms of similar ferocity to those that wreaked havoc across the country last week, even bringing a tornado to north-west London.

The IPCC has been forced to halve its predictions for sea-level rise by 2100, one of the key threats from climate change. It says improved data have reduced the upper estimate from 34 in to 17 in.

It also says that the overall human effect on global warming since the industrial revolution is less than had been thought, due to the unexpected levels of cooling caused by aerosol sprays, which reflect heat from the sun.

Large amounts of heat have been absorbed by the oceans, masking the warming effect.

Prof Rick Battarbee, the director of the Environmental Change Research Centre at University College London, warned these masking effects had helped to delay global warming but would lead to larger changes in the future.

He said: "The oceans have been acting like giant storage heaters by trapping heat and carbon dioxide. They might be bit of a time-bomb as they have been masking the real effects of the carbon dioxide we have been releasing into the atmosphere.

"People are very worried about what will happen in 2030 to 2050, as we think that at that point the oceans will no longer be able to absorb the carbon dioxide being emitted. It will be a tipping point and that is why it is now critical to act to counter any acceleration that will occur when this happens."

The report paints a bleak picture for future generations unless greenhouse gas emissions are reduced. It predicts that the climate will warm by 0.2 C a decade for the next two decades if emissions continue at current levels.

The report states that snow cover in mountainous regions will contract and permafrost in polar regions will decline.

However, Julian Morris, executive director of the International Policy Network, urged governments to be cautious. "There needs to be better data before billions of pounds are spent on policy measures that may have little impact," he said.

[KBCraig]

No, it's dictated by PEER REVIEW. 

Peers of a feather flock together.

If you're trying to say that peer-reviewed journals have some mechanism by which they exclude peers who do not agree with the approved dogma, then you're mistaken.

I'm not saying dissenters are excluded. I'm saying that "peer-reviewed journal" is a tired, meaningless phrase that offers no guarantee of accuracy. Any journal can claim to be "peer-reviewed". Reputable academics will reject some and gravitate towards others, but those journals of lower repute are still "peer-reviewed".

Brandishing the "peer-reviewed" banner doesn't guarantee a claim of accuracy. It only shows that the peers doing the review, whomever they might be, agreed with the author.

Kevin

[DC]

Group A says that carbon levels in the atmosphere are increasing far beyond what has been seen in the geophysical records since before Mankind's rise to the top of the food chain, that the average global temperature follows the same path as the levels of carbon in the atmosphere, that the Greenland and Antarctic ice shelves are melting very quickly as a result, and that sea levels will be rising significantly because of that, and because of thermal expansion of the water in the world's oceans.

1. Why do you say carbon levels in the atmosphere instead of co2?
2. I understand that Anartica is floating and when it melts it doesn't raise the level of water in the ocean just like the ice cube melting in a glass of water doesn't but Greenlands ice is on land so it would raise the levels.
3. Do the peer review scientist have an atmospheric co2 concentration chart and temperature of lower atmosphere chart for thousands of years that that they agree on? Can you give me a link if so?
4. who pays climatologist?