jryan

The link is about sunspot activity. The connection between that and warming is not discussed anywhere in the article, and it is certainly not "an article about a predicted extreme decline in that forcing" The forcing isn't discussed at all. How about establishing that connection?

This is where discussions fall apart. It isn't enough that we have established in several discussion here that sunspot activity does affect the suns radiative output. If that article doesn't specifically say that the lowest energy output of the sun in a few thousand years may also affect the Earth's temperature, it isn't a viable source for discussion.

As I said, the current models for global warming do not account for the dramatic drop in solar radiance in 14 years... so maybe they should start.

If it makes you all feel better though, I tracked this down:

http://www.spaceandscience.net/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/PressReleaseSSRC1-2008.doc

Sorry, I figured that a discussion that has revolved around the contribution of solar cycles as a GW forcing on several pages may have room for an article about a predicted extreme decline in that forcing. Especially when all the models should probably start account for this occurrance since it is fairly certain to happen.

But you are right.... anything that is both fairly predictable, and is used in most AGW models, couldn't be all that important. And we can just assume it will have no effect on the environment.. so why discuss it in the "Environmental Debate" thread, right?

Sheesh.

I wonder about this NASA report:

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2006/10may_longrange.htm

If AGW is real, is it a curse of a blessing? It would appear that we are in for a bit of a reprieve.

we used to have a philosophy and religion forum, it descended into chaos regularly and without warning. they generally reduced the quality of posting and leaked over into other forums. they are now severely discouraged.

That's a shame. It would be nice if people could discuss such things rationally... though I can see how people on both sides would have a propensity for circling the wagons and refusing to discuss the topic in an open and rational manor.

I've certainly been involved in a few of those over the years. Though I bow out when tempers needlessly flare.

I thought it was because there must have been a lot of bickering... but looking for a religion thread that isn't closed showed me that some times they are just closed because they are religion.

Are these discussion forbidden in this non-science section under "other topics"? And why?

Explain "internal variability". I'm not familiar with that term as a forcing.

Relax Tokyo! That's just a cloud!!

Well, I would guess that bio mass could be converted to oil in that same method, and it has all the necessary components. It just appears possible that bio mass isn't the ONLY thing that can be converted to oil, and that bio mass would be by far the smallest source of available material.

Assuming that it's true, of course.

I'll gladly address any specific questions.

Ok, what are you talking about?

Sounds like you are referring to religion.

????

I am a data security and data architecture planning specialist for a large national IT firm... I can assure you that data has, for all intents and purposes, the characteristics of a gas... It fills the container it is given.

Are you going to tell us why you need to know?

I'm not sure how rhetorical you're being. Native Americans didn't descend from Peking Man. I think you probably know that and are making a point.

I'm not saying Bigfoot is real either, and I don't believe it is real. I am simply telling you what the proper answer to your question is. Me not believing Bigfoot is real is not scientific. It is simply an opinion.

Also, you miss my point. Peking man was Homo Erectus, and my point was that Homo Erectus and the Native American are unrelated (one isn't descendant of the other), even though Homo Sapiens and Homo Erectus have some similar features. I am saying that Gigantopithecus and "Bigfoot" don't have to be the same, or even have one be a descendant of the other.

And it also doesn't matter how big Gigantopithecus actually was, either. But that staement was odd in and of itself... if we are so unsure even about Gigantopithecus size then why bring it up at all? All the "couldn't"s and "wouldn't"s fly out the window when you start conceding lack of knowledge of Gigantopithecus.

As I said before, the existence of Gigantopithecus, and whether or not his name was poorly chosen has no baring on Bigfoot. That is the thing about crytozology (as well as conspiracy theories) they thrive on the simple fact that science is not in the business of proving a negative. I could easily just say that Asia 300,000 years ago stopped being habitable for "Bigfoot", so it's Asian descendants died out, where as the Bigfoot in North America thrived.

There are no end of theories... you should only interest yourself in those that are demonstrably accurate, and those that are widely accepted as true before the evidence demostrates it to be. The first is sound science, the second is dangerous, and everything else is not worth your time unless you are paid to study it.

Bigfoot is said to be a North American Gigantopithecus. Thus, any evidence that suggests that Gigantopithecus couldn't match the descriptions of bigfoot constitutes evidence against it, at least as described.

 

Exhibit A): The secure link between Gigantopithecus and the the Sivapithecid apes, which were non-bipeds and relatives of the modern Orangutan. Bigfoot is described as a biped. It would have had to have evolved a remarkably human-like mode of locomotion completely independently, which no other large primate (see the gorilla or the extinct Archaeoindris) done. In both those cases, the adaptation evolved was knucklewalking.

 

Exhibit B): The teeth of Gigantopithecus. They're huge, and show clear adaptations for masticating heavy, fibrous foliage. Bigfoot is described as interested in and consuming meat. Gorillas, which have dentition much less specialized than Gigantopithecus, develop severe heart and cholesterol problems if they regularly consume even small quantities of meat, and shun it in the wild accordingly. They're just not adapted for it, and Gigantopithecus wouldn't have been either.

 

Exhibit C): The climate of northern North America and the experience of past primate extinctions both constitute evidence. The notion that Gigantopithecus "escaped" the changing climate in the late Pleistocene by fleeing to North America across a land bridge is based on an erroneous understanding of the concept of a refugia. By-in-large, and on a large scale, species survive climate change either because they adapt to their local conditions or they've previously colonized regions where the local conditions don't change. There would have been no reason for Gigantopithecus to move north into inhospitable Siberia and across a land bridge which it would have had to do to make it to North America. And accordingly, all the Gigantopithecus fossils that have been discovered have been from South Asia.

 

Ok, say you want to abandon the notion that Bigfoot is a remnant Gigantopithecus. Then it would have to have had ancestors (most plausibly hominid ancestors from Africa) that left no trace in the fossil record as they evolved across Asia, up into Siberia, and down into North America. Admittedly, you're on better ground here. Bigfoot is supposed to be rather ecologically insignificant, rare, and occurring in extremely low densities. Those would contribute to a scanty fossil record.

 

But why on earth should you think bigfoot exists in the first place except for eyewitness descriptions? Here evidence that bigfoot fits the description of the product of cultural imagination come into play in suggesting it's bunk.

 

Either way, you don't necessarily have to prove a negative to find evidence that leads to a negative conclusion.

 

 

 

What I cited constitutes good evidence.

You are simply shooting down some theories that say that Bigfoot is Gigantopithecus that migrated to North America. That doesn't indicate that Bigfoot probably doesn't exist, that just says that Bigfoot would probably not be Gigantopithecus. Which has no bearing on the existence of Bigfoot.

If anything, the fact that Gigantopithecus was found is more in line with broadening the possibility of large primates, as before that we had little evidence of giant primates that even resembled Bigfoot.

Using Gigantopithecus to discount Bigfoot is like saying that Peking Man couldn't cross the Northern land bridge, so the Native Americans are a bunch of fakers.

How about a new global warming topic that is unrelated to solar activity and the decadal contribution of each forcing?

Heh, that would be the third in as many weeks. I like your optimism.

The only scientific answer, in the absence of hard data, is #2. Both answer 1 and answer 3 are not supported, and here is why:

Answer 1) There is nothing in the current studies and collected data that would indicate the probability that the creature exists.

Answer 3) It is impossible to prove a negative.

I know I'm waay behind on this debate, but I saw this scanning the "Aliens" thread and it just bothered me a bit, so I thought I'd interject concerning it.

 

Regardless of every argument made about the relative certainty climate modelers have about the effects of aerosols, this argument is contrary to basic risk analysis. Risk takes into account both probability and potential consequences. If something is unlikely but catastrophic, it still may pay to take measures against it.

 

You seem to be accepting that humans are driving anthropogenic climate change, and that models can accurately predict that change minus the effect of aerosols. Well, like you say, we may be underestimating their effect and the consequences may be less catastrophic, or we may be overestimating their effect and the consequences may be more catastrophic.

 

The possibility of the worse scenario, even if the situation is as uncertain as you say it is, itself justifies action.

Well, then why not think about a few other potential catastrophes? On the off chance that the supervolcano in Yellowstone will blow in the next 100 years, should we mandate fallout shelters in all homes around the world? It would cetainly assist in survival. But of course we won't because the cost<-->benefit connection simply isn't there.

In the same way, if AGW isn't the primary driver, or an insignificant driver in GW (due to some yet seen or quantified forcing) then what is the alternative benefit of CO2 reduction? And is that alternative worth the cost?

No..

Thank you for the response. In that case I have still not found a peer reviewed response to the McIntyre peer reviewed critique of Mann's 1998 study. THe only rebuttals I find are from Mann in the "letters to Nature" section.

The temperature difference between locations isn't the source of the noise, though. The noise is because any given location can be hotter or cooler in any year because of local weather conditions. Which means that short-scale deviations between model and data that are below the noise threshold aren't statistically significant.

It can also be caused by a failure to properly piant measuring stations. NASA thought they had a grasp on statistically removing this noise, rather than actually painting stations regularly. They failed to properly adjust for these noise sources. This is partly what lead to the incorrect data on the NASA site.

Granted, this error is for a land area that is only 2% of Earth's surface... but are we skeptics supposed to just automatically assume that stations in third world countries are better maintained, or that the the noise is better accounted for?

Similarly the Mann study.. which McIntyre citiqued, and the critique was published in a peer review journal. Am I supposed to assume that a non-peer reviewed rebuttal is sufficient from a site for which Mann is a primary contributor?

Most skeptics, and cetainly all the ones I have read here, find that the number of errors that are well documented is reason enough to not accept everything coming out of IPCC, or from Mann etc. as correct by default? Even if the anti-skeptics were to provide verification that McIntyre accepted a billion dollars from Exxon to do his work, or that he made mistakes in other studies, it doesn't change the fact that he has successfully aired problems with he data.

I don't think any of us on the skeptic side are saying that we should accept the work of skeptics automatically as true anymore than we would say that Mann, IPCC, NASA or Al Gore should. What worries me is I rarely if ever see such a moderate view from the other side. iNow is just one of many examples. In a rush to discount McIntyre, many of his linked sources have made gross errors in their evaluations of McIntyre, and can only seem to cast doubt on him as a person through the old "connection to energy companies" and outright falsehoods.

I searched the realclimate entry, and the only two instances of "stupid" occur here:

 

"Prelude: It's the physics, stupid

 

…which of course is a paraphrase of Bill Clinton's famous quote regarding the economy. We put the last word in small letters since we've learned that it is not a good debating technique to imply (even inadvertently) that those who are having trouble seeing the force of our arguments might be stupid."

 

So where, exactly, is a "fellow climate scientist" being called "stupid?"

This is like if I were to say "I have been told by my mom that I should never call anyone an idiot. So I will not call you that.". This is a very transparent attempt to take the low road but claim the high ground.

I also can't help but note two other things:

(1) The climateaudit link does not accurately reproduce the above quote, and (more importantly)

(2) This has absolutely nothing at all to do with the science invloved. It's a diversion. It's inappropriate.

It's the intent, stupid.

I certainly don't believe you are stupid... but I am simply doing my own take on the realclimate title. Had I not explained that that statement is 100% against my own belief, what would you have felt the meaning was?

The trouble is that the author of that paper doesn't ever say that he doesn't believe that Courtillot is stupid... all he states is "We put the last word in small letters since we've learned that it is not a good debating technique to imply (even inadvertently) that those who are having trouble seeing the force of our arguments might be stupid.".... are we to assume that he "inadvertantly" included the word "stupid"? Does his PC have no edit function? This is a weak sidestep.

This is similar to a linked realclimate article (linked as it appeared in the statement above) where Gavin poo poos Crichton mentioning the use of private jets by many pro-AGW glitterati as a simple crowd pleaser and not paticularly useful (on this I agree), but then later in the same post metions that all of his debate team refused to take the SUV limo five blocks to the auditorium, where as all of Crichton's team had. This is a bizarre statement on many levels:

1) It isn't hypocrisy if Crichton does it as he isn't in the pro-AGW camp (though he does agree with the existence of some anthropogenic forcing)

2) If both Gavin and Crichton's statements are true, the scale of the two infractions is comically out of balance in favor of Crichton.

3) After stating that he and his fellows "are scientists, and we talk about science and we're not going start getting into questions of personal morality and wider political agendas", he goes on to do the opposite on the pages of Realclimate.org.

This is in line with my previous claims as to the questionable methods of debate used at Realclimate.org.

here you will find links to (I think) most of the original papers and the "Comments on" type papers and where they were published.

Thank you for that JohnB! I will read it when I have time to digest it fully.

One question though... are letters to the journal Nature considered peer reviewed publications?

To iNow

You would be wise to never use the IPCC summary report, nor it's list of signatories (actually contributors) as a verification of anything.

Paul Reiter completely dismantled the validity of that report, and the assumed agreement of it's contributors with the final summary.

Pay close attention to sections 13 through 18.. though you would be well advised to read the whole thing.

Now for the rest of your previous statement:

You have still evaded the original question put to you, which was a request to support your assertion that the site (realclimate.org) summarily dismisses information not in agreement with them.

 

Do you have any evidence that this has happened?

For someone as quick to claim that your statements were misrepresented, and that your questions are never answered, you sure have a habit of misrepresenting peoples statements and inability to answer questions.

Where did I say "summarily dismiss information not in agreement with them"?

An example of what I WAS saying, and not what you misrepresented me as saying, can be seen here.

While a supposed professional climate scientist calling another fellow climate scientist "stupid", among other things, is out of line in a study review... it does shed light on where you picked up your debate style.

You can read a very interesting observation of this childish realclimate article here.

And please stop appealing to shame because I ask you to supply sources to support your claims. This is, after all, a science forum. If you cannot support your claims and assertions with evidence then you should not be making them.

And I do when I feel is necessary. But when my commentary is self evident, or uses YOUR data as evidence, you really shouldn't be asking me for any.

Well, that's great. I appreciate you trying to help me become better. I hope to be able to reciprocate that with you, and that we achieve mutual betterment in the process.

Hey look! We agree!

However, you continue attacking me and my style, instead of the data, and you are not sharing supporting evidence of your claims, so this suggests that your own debate style is also lacking.

I have already commented on your posts.. though I wouldn't really call them "data". You posted several graphs a while back, and several opinion pieces. In many cases others have responded to you before I had a chance, and therefor there was no need for me to add a "yeah, what about that question that other guy asked you?". This method cuts down on the noise and repetition in these discussions. Where I have commented on your documents, you have chosen to call my responses insufficient.

For example, in the often sited graph of models (Mann, Jones, and others) I commented on how inaccurate those models are when they had to rely on historical proxy data. This is self evident as the lines diverge dramatically on the graph as you travel the X axis back through history. They only agree when the answer was already known. I do not need to provide external evidence for that observation. It is self evident.

When you inquired about McIntyre, and his correction of the NASA data, I provided evidence. I can only assume that you accepted that, because you dropped the subject. I, and other posters, targeted your sources and fairly well demonstrated that they were not telling the truth about McIntyre (ie. he actually has published peer reviewed material... his NASA paper was actually peer reviewed.. hence the correction by NASA... unless you want to assume that NASA took a non peer reviewed critique, and then didn't review it's correction either before changing their data... I suggest you not try that gambit as it is a lose-lose proposition for you)

You are correct that you did share ONE reference above, and you are correct that I wasn't satisfied with it's source. Knowing that the source of your citation has been involved with numerous falsehoods, has not been published in any peer-reviewed journals, and that this source has repeatedly been debunked for his continued misrepresentation of facts, I find my request for another source (or, more appropriate, sources) in support of your claims to be entirely valid (as I'm sure will most other readers here).

Your assault on the source actually perpetuates a falsehood of it's own. Go back and read. Also, McIntyre and McKitrick's critique of the 1999 Mann study was published in Geophysical Research Letters, a peer reviewed journal (article: Geophys. Res. Lett. 2005 32 L03710)

Funny how that is, eh? I make a statement and provide a source, you rush out and find some method to impugn the source, provide a link to something damning my source... and it turns out YOUR source is actually the one demonstrably distributing falsehoods.

Furthermore, there is a funny thing about all this: Mann's study was peer reviewed, and McIntyre's critique was peer reviewed.. yet only one is right.

Yet the primary defense of Mann comes from RealClimate.Org.... a non-peer-reviewed blog for which Mann is a primary contributor.

Hmmmmmm.... I'm siding with McIntyre. Do you know if Mann has published a peer reviewed rebuttal (honest question)?

If you cannot find another source, that's fine, but it certainly would speak poorly to the substance, plausibility, and validity of your claims.

As you may be figuring out by now: On this subject it is not ME who needs to be finding a new source.

And yes, I would prefer that you offer .edu or .gov sources, and you will notice I've tried to lead by example on this by using such sources when supporting my own arguments (with the exception of the links I provided discussing McIntyre's continued intellectual dishonesty and questionable motivations, despite one positive outcome of his work where he discovered an error in an early 1900s temperature data point and had it corrected).

And as I showed, the .gov site that you chose to link has been shown to be in error in the past concerning temperature data... by the way, I also posted another McIntyre article (which is easily verified by going to NASA's webpage) that shows that their very own GW FAQ relies heavily on RealClimate citation.

Also, before you get ahead of yourself... your citations are as rife with .org, .com and many other non .edu or .gov sites.

And your initial graph post had some .gov links, some no citation graphs, and a previous favorite of yours "SkepticalScience.com". I'm glad you stopped using that. Either way, regardless of the source of your links, they have often left several here asking questions regarding the actual certainty you draw from them. Few seem to be even designed to be convincing...

You mentioned that you knew what stawman means, so I am confident you also know what citation means, and a comment suggesting I go review my own posts here in the forums does not meet that criteria. Further, you are again appealing to shame, offering a mild ad hom, and continuing to avoid discussion of the data itself.

Ah, but I HAVE discussed the data you provided, from the very beginning. You object to the fact that I am pointing out curious things demonstrated by many of your sources without posting some peer reviewed paper that also carries my observation. I can say that the model graph you posted clearly shows that they don't agree beyond the small windows where the measurements being modeled were already known.... this is self evident.

You've mentioned that you don't find me to be a good debater, and I'm okay with that. My strength exists in the accuracy of the data I share and defend.

Well, on one hand you have the accuracy of the data that you share... on the other hand you have the interpretation of the data you share. On the interpretation we diverge.

But all your data in not accurate, as I have displayed in this very post.

However, in the spirit of mutual betterment, I again ask that you stop attacking me directly and cease your appeals to shame and that you instead focus on the data itself and start supplying evidence and data in support of your claims and your position.

My attacks on you were with regards to your attacks on others (and me). You stop doing that and you will be amazed at my restraint.

As for focusing on the data... that is a funny statement as our biggest disagreement is with regard to my comments on the data. How do I focus on it and discuss it without commenting on it? If I see something in your data that contradicts your statement of what that data shows, I will say that. That is "focusing on the data"... I suggest you focus on the oppositions data rather than attempt to discredit the oppositions sources... so far your attempts seem to be backfiring.

That is not an ad hominem, by the way, that is just me focusing on the data again.

NASA has themselves acknowledged (and corrected) the error. Lockheed was asking you to be specific where RealClimate.org discounted evidence that wasn't "in complete agreement" with their positions.

 

If you genuinely missed the tone of his request, then please address it now. However, I do get the sense that you knew precisely what he meant, and chose only to address the comment for which you had a ready response.

 

We know there was an error with a data point which has since been corrected. We want to see you support your claim that this site summarily dismisses information not in agreement with some agenda. Now that it's clear, let's see how you respond.

I know they acknowledged the error... what you fail to understand is that McIntyre brought it to there attention. It says so in the article I showed you.

Of all the things this thread has discussed, this is the one you choose not to google for yourself? Wow...

 

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man

I know the definition of a straw man argument, it just doesn't apply here.

Btw... We're all still waiting for you to make a claim that is supported by evidence. Thus far, you've been throwing rhetorical feces in the hope of sowing the seeds of doubt. Make a claim and support it. That is the thrust of this whole thread. If you cannot, then you should stop posting in it.

I have, your problem is that you fall into an all too comon method of discussion and debate online... that being that you refuse to accept self evident statements, and you refuse to accept, much less read, evidence that doesn't fit in with your belief system. So until I can produce a link for my argument from a source that YOU approve of, you will continue to argue that no evidence was given, and nobody can make an observation of their own without some third party (which you have to approve of). I provided an article to show that McIntyre actually was the genisis for the data correction at NASA... something that you could have "googled yourself", as you put it.

You are not a very strong debater, and your propensity to toss out invectives and ad hominems is an all to telling sign that you really aren't comfortable entertaining the possibility that you aren't 100% right.

If you need citation of that assertion, go read your own posts.

But you haven't demonstrated it to be wrong. Just because it is a wiki doesn't mean its invalid or wrong.

Of course it doesn't... but it also means that the person posting the information doesn't have to be right either. And I am not stating that they are wrong, either.. just that that site gives no link to the verification.

And either way, the "big oil" arguments are tired, and not a particularly sound method of proving a point. It falls under the heading "conspiracy theory".

Can you be a little bit more specific here? Can you actually show us where this happened? And most importantly, can you provide us a peer reviewed study that is not in complete agreement. You are making claims, now you have to back them up.

http://www.thestar.com/News/article/246027

You can find the documentation in many places. I'm suprised you haven't heard of it, even if you didn't know who found the errors.

This is nothing more than a strawman on your part.

I'm not sure you know what a strawman argument is. Could you maybe clarify what you mean?

Yes, that is funny, especially since I never said that. Please stop misrepresenting my posts.

THat is plain semantics. You said that McIntyre "shouldn't be associated with honest climate research."

... so your big defense is that I misrepresented you as saying "should never listen to" rather than "should never be associated with any honest climate research". Care to explain to me the practical difference between the two statements?

Should we listen to him, but also not associate him with other studies? Or not mention any issues that he may bring up with individual studies.

Explain how that is supposed to work again?

Or maybe just explain when we should listen to McIntyre?

You should really check your sources prior to relying on them too heavily. The name "Steve McIntyre" shouldn't be associated with honest climate research.

 

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Stephen_McIntyre

 

http://info-pollution.com/mandm.htm

 

You also appear to have completely missed the tone and context of my previous comments. That... or you're intentionally misrepresenting what I've said. Either way, look again.

This is funny... Sourcewatch is a Wiki site. The contribution and corroboration there is nil. With regard to GCX, that neither supports nor refutes a claim. These "Big Oil" dodges are nothing more than just that... a dodge.

Now info-pollution.com... the main page states:

Welcome to Info-pollution. Here I look at the wide variety information pollution. While I will try to look at all forms, I will concentrate on the areas I am most interested in, including anti-environmental myths and skepticism.

.... so his primary target is "skepticism"? And his positions and evidence rely heavily on RealClimate.org... which, last I checked, is not considered a "peer reviewed" source. It may link peer reviewed sources... but it sure pulls out the guns when peers review studies and are not in complete agreement.

And it's funny that you say he should never be listened to... his efforts eventually got NASA to eventually correct their surface temperature data. So someone is certainly listening.

This is nothing more than an ad hominem attack on your part.

Why is that it's only the deniers who aren't sharing data in support of their claims, try to limit the datasets, or engage in significant logical fallacies? Hmmm...

Strange... for someone that demands citation, I would have assumed that you would provide some for this statement.

But in the spirit of debate, I can provide you with studies based on limited datasets, if you want, from your side of the isle.

Here is just one

Another black mark for NASA

I would have assumed that they would have had enough climate scientists on staff to complete a GW FAQ without pushing the answers off on sources not subject to federal QC oversight.