Climate Change Porn

There seems to be a lot of global warming porn going around. We have examples of porn addicts publicly confessing and swearing off their addiction.

And others can't get enough. A confirmed "CO2 is rising and we are all doomed" fellow cites the following articles on the drastic consequences of man's interference with the air.

First off we are going to be missing a lot of Birds.

Second off whole species will be Extinct by 2050 according to National Geographic. Or they will be on their way to extiction by then. Millions of species. How exciting. I used to get my porn from National Geographic when I was young. It appears not much has changed.

But wait. I have a few thoughts on the extinction report. The opening from the National Geographic piece. Bolding mine:

By 2050, rising temperatures exacerbated by human-induced belches of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases could send more than a million of Earth's land-dwelling plants and animals down the road to extinction, according to a recent study.

It could happen.

They could be going down the road. The question is how far down the road will they get?

BTW will the coming ice age go down the same road in the other direction?

Or is our only chance to keep things just as they are?

Me? I believe in evolution. Adapt or die.

Plants will certainly like more CO2 in the atmosphere. I like trees. I eat plants. I see a plus there.

I don't see how a 1 deg C diff in annual variations of 50 deg C is going to make a huge difference in the biota of the planet.

What is more likey is that the range of various plants and animals will change. Which happens all the time with just weather variations and various predator/prey cycles.

Well, time to get back to work on Bussard Fusion. However, just like a porn addict I'm not easily convinced to turn to useful work. So I want to take a look at just how hard it will be for plants and animals to adapt.

In the town I live in, at the the Chicago latitude, winter temperatures of -10 F are regular occurances and -20 F is not unheard of. Summer temperatures of 90 F are regular occurances and 100 F is not unheard of.

Normal variation is then 100 deg F and extremes can be 120 deg F.

5/9 * 100 = 55.56 deg C delta
5/9 * 120 = 66.67 deg C delta (the devil made me do it)

So temperature variations of 50 deg C over a year are entirely reasonable.

Do we get that in one day? No.

Birds - which do not handle such a wide range migrate. Their migration patterns will change.

A change in average temperature of even a few deg C is not going to kill off millions of species. Unless your analysis assumes that the range of a given population is restricted. Which of course it is not. Same for plants. They don't migrate as fast. However even a 10 deg F change in 100 years is only .1 deg F per year. Annuals will have no trouble. Longer lived plans will spread to their optimum areas by seed migration. Birds are a help with that.

I think the National Geographic article is just Climate Change Porn.

Assuming the study the article was based on was done by reputable scientists, all it proves is that given the "correct" assumptions you can get any answer you want.

I have heard numerous anecdotes that funding for any kind of science is easier to get if you can tie it into climate change.

One has to wonder if this is an example of that?

I'd like to see what oil company funded scientists might have to say on the matter.

Politicized science helps no one. However, it is not unusual. The Soviets were big on that sort of thing. A certain country run by an Austrian Corporal followed a similar path.

Is something like that happening with Climate Science? I have my suspicions. One of the things that make me suspicious is that the answer always is: restriction on energy use and highger taxes. Technological fixes (nuclear plants and wind turbines) and bio-remediation (planting trees) are never considered viable alternatives. In fact Kyoto specifically rejected bioremediation - a USA proposal. Political? It would seem so.

Cross Posted at Power and Control

posted by Simon on 06.07.07 at 10:09 AM





TrackBack

TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://classicalvalues.com/cgi-bin/pings.cgi/5107






Comments

Your second formula should be:
5/9 * 140 = 66.7 deg C delta. You can delete this comment if you edit your post

John M Reynolds

jmrSudbury   ·  June 7, 2007 10:38 AM

The whole extinction argument boiled down to lack of food and lack of habitat. The main culprit is actually land use changes by people trying to grow enough food to feed the increasing (at a slowing rate) population. Here is a quote from the http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/education/reports/hansen/HansenTestimonyCritique.pdf file.

"One thing that Hansen does not foresee, however, is the shortfall in food production that may exist just a few short decades from now. Even considering hoped-for advancements in agricultural expertise and anticipated improvements in farming techniques, a number of knowledgeable scientists project there will be insufficient food to support the human population of the planet expected in the year 2050, unless humanity usurps all of the earth’s remaining freshwater resources, as well as a good proportion of its cultivatable land, merely to grow what we will need to sustain ourselves at that point in time. These actions, if taken, will drastically reduce the amount of natural habitat available for the many plant and animal species with which we share the planet, insuring the extinctions of
vast numbers of them, unless the air’s CO2 content continues to rise, so that the crop productivity enhancement provided by CO2’s aerial fertilization effect, along with the increase in crop water use efficiency provided by its anti-transpiration effect, can obviate the need for the land and water takings that will otherwise be required to meet the predicted shortfall in agricultural production."

John M Reynolds

jmrSudbury   ·  June 7, 2007 10:45 AM

M. Simon,

Your discussion of the temperature variation in Chicago provides an excellent explanation of why many people (and probably more than a few flora & fauna) don't like living in Chicago. There's too much temperature variation. I wouldn't want to have a country, never mind an entire world, populated only by people who could only survive Chicago.

OK, that's a nasty dig, not completely fair to Chicagoans. But my point is that if you think that the world, as it is, is basically a good thing, you ought to be cautious (should we use the word conservative?) about effecting changes that will significantly alter it.

Personally, I have seen many articles over the years expressing concern at the very high expected rates of species die-out (leaving no descendants). So now you want to say that everybody, including scientists who study these things professionally, that talks about species die-out is in the pay of the vast environmental conspiracy? Whatever...

I think it would be helpful if you didn't keep conflating the scientific with the policy issues:

- The domain of science is DESCRIPTIVE: What is happening, and why.

- The domain of policy is NORMATIVE: What should we do?

People talking about the science are talking about what is going on: In this case, with species populations and expected impacts; in other cases, with global warming.

People talking about policy are talking about carbon taxes, increased efficiency, nuclear power (You seem to think that no one outside of your blog-space is thinking about nuclear power: This happens not to be true.), wind turbines, etc.

Dismissing the science because you don't like what you see as the policy implications? This is a recipe for wishful thinking.

Neal J. King   ·  June 7, 2007 01:02 PM

John M. Reynolds,

An increase in C-O2 is not going to guarantee more agricultural crop yield. It will only make a difference in regions where C-O2 is the limiting factor. I'm pretty sure that it is not, in many cases.

If Australia is an example, what we see is that climate change in some cases exacerbates shortage of water, which is a primary and direct cause of agricultural problems. I recall also reading about similar predictions about sub-Saharan Africa and southern China.

One place where I recall reading about confident predictions of more precipitation: Antarctica. I guess we could ship farmers down there...

Neal J. King   ·  June 7, 2007 01:24 PM

Well,

Sceptics are tagged as in the pay of the carbon producers. I thought I'd have a little fun.

There are significant "Environmental" groups against wind ("bird cusinarts"), solar voltaics ( the desert environment would be irrepairably harmed), dams (tear them down and let the fish swim free), nuclear power (well I have to admit I don't care for plutonium) etc.

Too many are hoping for a zero consequence choice. A rare animalindeed.

As to Chicago: wild animals, wild people. I like that.

M. Simon   ·  June 7, 2007 01:37 PM

John M. Reynolds:

Water supply & Global Warming:
http://www.reuters.com/article/scienceNews/idUSN0725512820070607?feedType=RSS&rpc=22

Neal J. King   ·  June 7, 2007 02:47 PM

Hi Neal J. King. You are pretty sure that C-O2 is not the limiting factor, in many cases because you did not read the pdf to which I linked.

You have not countered the claim that studies have shown CO2 aerial fertilization effect will help and that crop water use efficiency provided by its anti-transpiration effect will actually reduce water consumption. This means that warmer temperatures coupled with higher CO2 levels helps plants grow.

I would love to know more about your theory on how global warming will change weather patterns thus causing high pressure areas to stall over land masses for extended periods of time thus causing droughts. This happens in North America with El Nina and in Southern Asia with El Nino. Of course, the opposite is true as well. Low pressure systems dominate North America with El Nino while El Nina causes low pressure systems to dominate in Southern Asia. This is getting a bit off topic for this thread though.

About your link, if the people living in the mountains have come to rely on the increased water flow since the earth has been warming since the last ice age, or even the little ice age just a couple hundred years ago, then they will have a difficult time when the glaciers melt.

Finally getting back on topic, about the temp difference, where I live, the temp swing is from -30 to +30 C but it sometimes hits extremes of -35 to +35 C. That is a 60 to 70 C temperature differential. And you thought Chicago was bad!

And about planting trees, I had heard on the CBC radio that South Africans are pulling up many of the trees that were planted in recent decades because the change was too fast. The extra trees caused the water table to drop too much.

John M Reynolds

jmrSudbury   ·  June 7, 2007 03:35 PM

John M. Reynolds,

You are relying for your information on an article by Idso, who is well known to be a "GW skeptic", but is not, I believe considered an expert on botany or agriculture. His principal source on the C-O2/plant issue is an article by Jurik et a. (1984), "Short-term effects of CO2 on gas exchange of leaves of bigtooth aspen (Populus grandidentata) in the field." I looked up that article at
(http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/picrender.fcgi?artid=1067045&blobtype=pdf)
and found the following statement at the beginning:
"The short term effects of high CO2 levels on photosynthesis of plants grown in ambient CO2 levels have received some attention (see 18). Unfortunately, the photosynthesis and growth of plants grown in high CO2 may not match the short term responses to high CO2 of plants grown in our present ambient CO2 levels. For example, Gates et al. (8) found more than 100 studies of plant growth and development that confirm changes in plant characters with increased CO2 levels. Recent studies (e.g. 9, 20, 25) have attempted to refine our understanding of the interactions of C02, nutrients, water, light, and other environmental factors so that we will have a sound physiological basis for predicting plant response to future conditions."

What that warns me is that one should be careful about extrapolating the results of a study of the short-term effects to the life-cycle effects.

Now, that doesn't in itself negate the results obtained. However, I note that this is a highly significant limitation on the possible implications of the study, which Idso failed to draw attention to. Similarly, this paper was published about 13 years ago: during that period of time, I would have expected that a topic of such interest should have received some follow-up work, and that there should be a more recent paper, perhaps one that would present some evaluation of suggestions made in the following 13 years.

Furthermore, this fits into my more general concern, which is that the report does not make any indication that they attempted to see what what happen if other growth factors were withheld.

Likewise, although Idso & Idso talk about reduced need for water due to anti-transpiration effects, he gives no reference for them, and does not quantify this.

My point is that Idso & Idso are writing a paper with a clearly defined target - to attack Hansen's talk - and they are quoting papers in various fields, but without giving the requisite background to evaluate the implications of what is being said. And I don't see that either of them are experts in the fine details of plant respiration and growth. (No, I don't think agronomy counts: that's an area of application, not a starting point for scientific investigation.)

So I feel much safer in one of two cases:
- When I can follow the reasoning fully (that includes understanding pretty well the full implications of what is cited, and not just accepting the debater's interpretation of what is implied); or
- If the people writing the article have a clear interest in maintaining a professional reputation in the field about which he is making specific technical statements.

I don't see that either of these situations apply to the Idso & Idso article: I don't know enough to know what caveats should be considered for this 13-year-old paper, and I don't think the Idsos face any specific opprobrium if they should misinterpret something in a technical area of botany: It isn't their area.

As I have mentioned, I have seen numerous articles over the last year, by people who do research on extinction issues, and who are specifically detailed to estimate the impact of climate change on extinction; and by journalists reporting on their work. Certainly the researchers face embarrassment if their methodology or results turn out to be off-the-wall. So I think they have a much higher need to be right, on this their area of professional endeavor.

Neal J. King   ·  June 7, 2007 05:30 PM

Correction to above:

"You are relying for your information on an article by Idso, who is well known to be a "GW skeptic", but is not, I believe considered an expert on botany or agriculture"

should be:

"You are relying for your information on an article by Idso & Idso, who are well known to be "GW skeptics", but are not, I believe considered experts on botany or plant respiration"

Neal J. King   ·  June 7, 2007 05:38 PM

97 million birds dead because they demanded the right of way from buildings. Makes me wonder how they navigated around trees.
Here is another GISS station, Quincy I think.
It looks to be midday, judging by the shadows, which means we are looking in a northern direction. So we have a thicket of trees to deflect the Arctic winds, plus 180 degrees of asphalt heatsink to augment the delta flow.
Is this temperature station worthless for detecting a 0.6 degree rise? What do you think.

Papertiger   ·  June 8, 2007 03:42 AM

Papertiger,

- Birds: I think it has to do with the windows: Some of them haven't adapted to the concept of something solid that you can't see.

- GISS station: This goes back to the whole "urban heat island" issue. According to the discussion last time (I think it was with you), there may well be a UHI delta (comparing urban temperatures with rural), but it doesn't seem to have affected the trend. This goes back to the windy-day argument: There is no difference between the temperature-increase over the time period, whether you focus on windy days or take all the days. If the trend were actually due to a growing delta due to UHI, windy days should NOT show this trend, but non-windy days should.

- In any case, there is now more reliance on satellite measurements. And, as I pointed out on another thread, you can see heating up going on over the northern hemisphere, including large sections of northern North America and over oceanic areas. No urban heat islands there!

Neal J. King   ·  June 8, 2007 04:07 AM

Papertiger:

The wood chips around the weather station is not considered to be a natural environment. It is warm to walk on as compared to grassland. I think that is also the station that has a light installed inside the Stephenson screen and, for some reason, a blower fan. I wonder if Simon is willing to put up a post about the http://surfacestations.org/ project to start to get photographic evidence of GISS stations? Or is there one already and I missed it? There is much more there than just UHI to look at though like the recent http://climatesci.colorado.edu/publications/pdf/R-321.pdf file for example.

Neal J. King:

"Unfortunately, the photosynthesis and growth of plants grown in high CO2 may not match the short term responses to high CO2 of plants grown in our present ambient CO2 levels."

I guarantee that the growth will not match the short term responses. There are too many variables. What matters is the trend. The exact rate of increased growth does not matter. The fact that it is a large positive is what matters.

Don't complain about the age of a study. That is pointless. Complain about the methodology or assumptions, but not the age.

"I note that this is a highly significant limitation on the possible implications of the study..." I would love to see your regression calculation that will back up your claim that any limitations of the study are "highly significant." I would also like to know what growth factors you think should have been withheld and studied. The whole anthropogenic global warming theory is based on greenhouse gas levels rising. If CO2 rises and temperature rises, then the plant growth increases. Perhaps the fact that the rate of methane concentration increase, the second most effective greenhouse forcing (just behind CO2), has not been accelerating but has been declining and is now near 0 growth rate, should be considered. It is decreasing though people like Hansen say the green house gas levels are accelerating. Is that a growth factor? Should it be withheld?

"My point is that Idso & Idso are writing a paper with a clearly defined target - to attack Hansen's talk" That is the purpose of science. Make a hypothesis, test it, then get others to try to disprove it. They are not attacking the talk, they are attacking the opinions Hansen raised as though his opinions are fact.

Suggesting that someone is a skeptic is a good thing in science. All scientists should be skeptics. I do wonder why you suggest that some researchers are not worried their reputations. That does not make sense.

Finally, you make a huge claim that Idso and Idso do not give references. Page 19 of the pdf says, "[E]levated atmospheric CO2 concentrations typically increase plant ... water-use efficiency, as may be verified by perusing the many reviews of scientific journal articles we have produced on these topics and archived in the Subject Index of our website (www.co2science.org)." pg 19

They are standing on the shoulders of giants. They make many references to the work of others. I find they do a nice job of summarizing and putting it all together in a logical and fairly easy to understand way. I don't know why you cannot follow their reasoning. Did you even read at least the sections on the effect of CO2 on plants (pages 13-19)? It is a complex subject though. That is the problem with climate science. It encompasses so many fields due to its complexity, it is difficult to see the forest for the trees.

The big picture is this. People like Hansen who make claims based on models of certain scenarios have to expect that they will get proven wrong since their scenarios constantly do not live up to real life observations.

jmrSudbury   ·  June 8, 2007 10:12 AM

John M Reynolds:

- "I guarantee that the growth will not match the short term responses. There are too many variables. What matters is the trend. The exact rate of increased growth does not matter. The fact that it is a large positive is what matters."
I disagree: An effect can saturate or reverse. This is well-known in biological circumstances. Consider the cases in which a promising drug turned out NOT to be a cure for a problem, after the study was continued beyond the initial phase. I think there was a recent heart-attack medication which had this problem, wasn't there?

- "Don't complain about the age of a study. That is pointless. Complain about the methodology or assumptions, but not the age."
The reason I mention the age of the article was that it left some obvious holes (one being the question of long-term vs. short-term effect). Since the topic is of great interest, I would have thought that there might be follow-up studies on this matter, since it is 13 years old. Now, if Idso & Idso were professionals in this area of study, I would feel more confident that they were in fact citing the most current and up-to-date studies. But they are not, and therefore I think I'm entitled to wonder if a bit of cherry-picking is going on. If they were citing a paper in physics, I would be able to use my own resources and training and check it out. As it is, I just have to wonder why they cite a paper that is as old as that, without any later confirmatory studies. This is not a ding on the the paper cited; it is an expression of distrust on the citing. I have seen a lot of papers cited by those trying to disprove GW, in which the citation was not correct (i.e., statements taken out of context were presented as the intent of the cited paper, whereas a reading of the full article revealed an entirely opposite meaning).

"I note that this is a highly significant limitation on the possible implications of the study..." I would love to see your regression calculation that will back up your claim that any limitations of the study are "highly significant."
Common sense: If a short-term study shows a medical treatment is promising, but a long-term study shows that it kills people, the difference is significant. Don't you think so?

"I would also like to know what growth factors you think should have been withheld and studied."
Availability of water would be an issue: If you look at the Australian drought situation, I don't think that any plausible increase in C-O2 is going to make up for their lack of water - which is attributed to GW. Another issue would availability of other nutrients, like minerals and organic matter. The point is that even if the effect is real, it may not matter in a practical situation. Analogy: Having a knife improves your defensive posture; but if your enemy has an AK-47 aimed at you, there is not going to be any practical improvement in your situation, is there?

"My point is that Idso & Idso are writing a paper with a clearly defined target - to attack Hansen's talk" That is the purpose of science...I do wonder why you suggest that some researchers are not worried [about] their reputations. That does not make sense.
My point is not that they are attacking Hansen's position: Indeed, positions are taken in order to be defended. My point is that their method of attack is not based in disciplines in which they have any professional investment. For example, if a physicist attacks Hansen's position based on physics, he knows that if he says something idiotic, he is likely to be accosted sometime in the hallway by a colleague who asks, "You know, you said the most idiotic thing in that article on GW. It's textbook physics that..." That's likely to be a highly embarrassing encounter. So he's not likely to do that: He'll be really careful. But if the same physicist uses an argument in botany instead, there are two advantages: a) He probably isn't going to meet a botanist in his departmental neighborhood, and b) Even if he does, the botanist will shrug it off with the thought, "Another dumb physicist spouting off about things he doesn't know anything about." In other words, he gets a free pass.


"Finally, you make a huge claim that Idso and Idso do not give references."
Nor did I: How could I have critiqued their presentation of the results of the study we talked about above, if I hadn't found their references?

My point was that they don't do a very good job of contextualizing their citations: they don't explain the limitations of the conclusions that can be drawn. And, as I said before, I have no reason to trust them outside of their area of professional expertise: Biological arguments, unlike mathematical ones, are famously sensitive to rather detailed knowledge of what is actually going on; and this knowledge changes on almost a daily basis.

The difference is palpable: When I was studying physics at CalTech, unless we were talking about advanced particle physics, we never had reference to current events. On the other hand, a friend of mine studying biology was thrilled because, in her freshman biology class, every other week, the professor found it useful to introduce a topic by saying, "Last week in Paris..." or even "This morning in London...". So you expect me to be satisfied with a 13-year-old reference?

"The big picture is this. People like Hansen who make claims based on models of certain scenarios have to expect that they will get proven wrong since their scenarios constantly do not live up to real life observations."
To my knowledge, Hansen is famous for having gone out on a limb in 1989 to predict global warming at a time when most climatologists were doubtful about the idea. He predicted the next 10 years of temperature growth - and got it pretty good (with the exception of the eruption of Pinotuba, which introduced a kink for a year or so). So where have you found an example of his being proven wrong?

Neal J. King   ·  June 8, 2007 07:41 PM

In any case, there is now more reliance on satellite measurements. And, as I pointed out on another thread, you can see heating up going on over the northern hemisphere, including large sections of northern North America and over oceanic areas.
According to the satellite measurements May 2007 was 0.35 C cooler than January 2007.

Papertiger   ·  June 9, 2007 02:26 PM

Papertiger,

Climate is a long-term issue. You can't tell anything from a short-term variation - neither from this nor from Katrina.

The smoothing applied is a 5-year running average. Which, by the way, was what the papers you were quoting (about CRF, etc.) were doing as well.

Neal J. King   ·  June 9, 2007 02:58 PM

I see. Cover your eyes. Put your fingers in your ears. Repeat over and over again "short-term variation".
Ave. Arctic temperature dropped 1.91 degrees in May. How will the reindeer cope?
Too cold, and they can't hoof their way to the tender grass. Too hot and they catch the ticks.
Sounds to me like your story had nothing to do with endangered reindeer, rather it was all about inconvenienced reindeer herders.

You can't tell anything from a short-term variation - neither from this nor from Katrina.
Preaching to the choir. Of course AGW had nothing to do with Katrina, because AGW is a myth.

Why don't you go over and disabuse some of your more benighted co believers.

Papertiger   ·  June 9, 2007 06:29 PM

Papertiger:

- Short term variation: I state this because it is you who have been covering your eyes and ears: Look at the 5-year average>.

- Reindeer: I mention this because many people just say, "Oh, all those other species will be able to cope with it. They won't die off." The example of the reindeer shows some rather detailed problems that they certainly cannot cope with, and they are surviving only by their dependence on humans. Think of all those species that no one takes any direct economic interest in: No one will be trying to solve their problems. The result will be a massive die-out of species.

Sorry, Papertiger: I'm not going away. You're free to take on the folks at RealClimate if you like.

Neal J. King   ·  June 10, 2007 07:52 AM

Sorry, Papertiger: I'm not going away. You're free to take on the folks at RealClimate if you like.
So you really don't believe your own words regarding short term variation.

Example: linking a five year trend in reindeer transportation activities and saying this is climate change. Here is the exact passage "But, Sara explained, "in the past five years, some herders have had to put the reindeers in trucks to make the migration."
Five years sounds important when you are talking sore reindeer hooves.
When we are talking temperature trends - not so much.
You say, "But in 2005, the three competing teams found that an algebra mistake that had been hiding in their software for 10 years had been causing this discrepancy." Somehow this ten years of bad algebra negates the satellite accuracy, and yet the satellite record dates back to the 70's.
We are going on ten years since a record high, even using the odeous surface temperature measurement. But you refer to this ten years as waiting for the waterbed ripples to flatten out.

You claim there are massive species die outs using a dubious time frame of three per hour.
Where are the victims? Show me the bodys. Dig em up if you have too.

Conclusion: It seems to me that your evidence and rules for what is significant are highly variable, and patheticly one sided. This makes you a propagandist, much like the people over at Realclimate claiming that AGW is making hurricanes except when the hurricane number drops.
Then they look at their shoes and whistle until no one is looking, then it is back to AGW is intensifying hurricanes.
You won't correct them because you approve of their method.

Papertiger   ·  June 11, 2007 12:51 AM

Papertiger,

You're getting your timeframes mixed up:

- Temperature trends: The temperature jumps up & down within 5 years. You look at the average, it's clear upward.

- Reindeer: They've been unable to manage their own migration for 5 years. That's in comparison to having been able to do it themselves for millennia. There's no jumpiness in that signal, it's already a clear trend: It's been established for 5 years.

Satellite data: Yes, it does negate the problem because it corrects it. The data from the previous period are not thrown away, the results are recalculated. The error was not in the collection of the data, it was in the algebra used to reduce them. The algebra has been redone after everybody understood who did the calculations wrong.

10 years since a record high: From a climate point of view, a record high, considered by itself, is just a curiosity. What matters is the average over time. So, if you want to calculate a trend in climate, you need to apply a running average. Look at the graph again: It's pretty clear what that running average is doing. It's going up.

Species die outs: Here's a recent report from the UN.

RealClimate: Actually, I have made comments from time to time, critical if necessary. But there are lots of people discussing things on both sides, sometimes rather fine technical points. The original postings are generally pretty good, since the people who run the site are professional climate scientists, who post their names and have to stand behind what they say professionally.

Neal J. King   ·  June 11, 2007 03:12 AM

About the reindeer, the UN article says, "Global warming is adding to threats such as land clearance for farms or cities, pollution and rising human populations." How much is due to global warming vs how much is due to changes in land use?

In 1991, the Pinatubo volcano caused the temp to drop. What is causing the current temp to level off? It is certainly not rising. It is not above the 1998 level. Why do you want to ignore data points Neal? That is one of the main problems with the anthropogenic global warming (AGW) theory. It ignores too much data. The AWG theory suggests that rising CO2 will cause the temperature to rise. Since 1998, it has not risen even though CO2 levels continue to rise. There are some dips and eccentricities that cause the temp to drop for a few years as shown in the http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f4/Instrumental_Temperature_Record.png picture. We know volcanoes caused the dips around 1991 and 1984. What is causing the current leveling off?

I appreciate your inclination to not believe people like Hansen, Gore, or Suzuki since they are not "professionals in this area of study." How can you say in one sentence that no new studies were done, then in the next sentence say that Idso and Idso did not use the most recent data? Unless you can point to newer studies that negate the original, then your comments are indeed a ding against the original study. In other words, I am still waiting for proof that plants do not benefit from increased CO2 and temperature beyond the short term. Show me the study that indicates that "limitations of the original study are 'highly significant.'"

Why do you keep going back to droughts? Droughts are not caused by CO2 levels. I am still waiting for you to show me a causal relationship between the stalling of high pressure systems and increasing levels of CO2.

John M Reynolds

jmrSudbury   ·  June 11, 2007 10:18 AM

John M Reynolds:

Reindeer
In the cited article, one problem that afflicted the reindeer was that their migration path had defrosted to the point that they couldn't make the trip without a lift (on trucks) from humans. That's not a land-use issue.
An even more immediate one that I just came across: the tuatara will go extinct in short order if the local average temperature goes up by 1 degree C. Why? Because gender determination among most reptiles is controlled by temperature, and if it goes up one more degree, all the tuatara eggs will hatch out male - no further reproduction will be possible. Since this is a general characteristic of reptiles, there are probably quite a few others who are also close to that particular edge.

"Temperature no longer rising"
As I keep saying, it makes very little sense to talk about climate change without using a smoothing function. It's typical to use a 5-year running average. Look at the result. The average is clearly climbing, even though it's very jumpy. Look at all the jumpiness in previous years as well. Weather is complicated: there are all sorts of cycles that are going on. That's why it makes sense to apply a "noise filter".

"Not professionals"
Hansen is a professional climatologist.
Gore is a presenter: I don't take him as an authority, and never have.
Suzuki: I'm not sure how this name links up (maybe he's the author of some article).
Idso & Idso are not professionals or experts in botanical processes. When they quote a 13-year-old paper, I am suspicious - just as I would be if someone, not an expert in particle physics, quoted a 13-year-old paper "proving his point" in that field: It could very well be cherry-picking, because particle physics changes so fast that you would expect someone to pick up on any important issue in that period. If I myself were a botanist, I would know where to start digging; as I could even now if the paper were in physics.

It is not a ding against the original study, it is a ding against the assumption that a 13-year-old study represents the current state of science.

As a counter-example: If a well-known physicist like Steven Weinberg were to reference one of Einstein's articles on an issue of general relativity, knowing Weinberg's accomplishments in physics and his concern for his professional reputation, I would be willing to grant that that paper could be taken as reflecting the current state of the science. However, if I met Joe Blow in the street, who claimed that a 50-year old paper by Einstein represented the last word on the topic, I would be inclined to be skeptical. Seems unfair, doesn't it? (Because it could be the same paper!) But that's the way it is: If I'm supposed to take it on authority that a specific paper represents state of the art, I have to be able to trust the authority. In general relativity or particle physics, I would accept Weinberg as an authority, but I wouldn't accept Blow. And, on issues of botanical mechanisms, I won't accept Idso & Idso.

Droughts
Here's an article on a study by NCAR: "The percentage of Earth's land area stricken by serious drought more than doubled from the 1970s to the early 2000s, according to a new analysis by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). Widespread drying occurred over much of Europe and Asia, Canada, western and southern Africa, and eastern Australia. Rising global temperatures appear to be a major factor, says NCAR's Aiguo Dai, lead author of the study."

I assume the folks at the National Center for Atmospheric Research know more about what causes droughts that either you or I.


Neal J. King   ·  June 11, 2007 03:04 PM

Neal, from your article a little good news, bad news.

First the good(?)
"Extinction rates are rising by a factor of up to 1,000 above natural rates. Every hour, three species disappear. Every day, up to 150 species are lost. Every year, between 18,000 and 55,000 species become extinct," he said.
Now the bad (well it's good news for the critters)
A "Red List" of endangered species, however, lists only 784 species driven to extinction since 1500 -- ranging from the dodo bird of Mauritius to the golden toad of Costa Rica. - as compiled by the World Conservation Union grouping 83 governments as well as scientists and environmental organizations.

Someones lying.

And I still haven't seen a corpse.


Papertiger   ·  June 11, 2007 04:20 PM

- Reindeer: They've been unable to manage their own migration for 5 years. That's in comparison to having been able to do it themselves for millennia.

Have they been keeping records of reindeer migration that long? Even your own article about the hardships of the reindeer herders qualified the suffering by adding it was only happening to "some".
"Some herders have had to delay the migration to the coast by a month ..."
"...some herders have had to put the reindeers in trucks..."

Papertiger   ·  June 11, 2007 04:33 PM

Papertiger,

Extinction rates:
- The higher rate (and I don't know why you would call it "good news") is based on an estimate of how many species there actually are. Only a small % of them are actually described and named, because of how few biologists there are. But these are the best estimates of what is going on, with respect to genetic diversity.

- The lower rate is based on i) named species that are listed as extinct; and ii) "extinct" means that no one's seen one for 50 years. So the official extinction rate is definitely going to be a lower limit on the actual rate of species disappearing from the planet: the number of species under consideration is smaller, and of these the moment of recognition of extinction is much delayed.

- Reindeer migration seems to be a part of their way of life. As far as I know about the natural history of reindeer, they probably wouldn't be able to survive without migration: they probably have to be in warmer climes for the calves to survive.

Neal J. King   ·  June 11, 2007 08:01 PM

The lower rate is based on i) named species that are listed as extinct; and ii) "extinct" means that no one's seen one for 50 years.

No, I believe the list is exhaustive. Take for instance the golden toad of Costa Rica mentioned in the article.
Hasn't been seen since 1989.

There is no time limit on their list.

So you make a claim of 3 an hour. Just name one. You can look back over the last twenty years. That gives you over 525,000 extinctions to choose from. All I want is one.
Or you could go this way.

Papertiger   ·  June 11, 2007 11:42 PM

Papertiger,

OK, I was wrong about the 50-year requirement (that was a criticism I had heard of Lomborg's estimates, and I jumped to the conclusion it applied here as well).

But you are wrong about the bigger picture. The article, from which you are getting the list, itself states:

A "Red List" of endangered species, however, lists only 784 species driven to extinction since 1500 -- ranging from the dodo bird of Mauritius to the golden toad of Costa Rica.

Craig Hilton-Taylor, manager of the list compiled by the World Conservation Union grouping 83 governments as well as scientists and environmental organizations, said the hugely varying figures might both be right, in their way.

"The U.N. figures are based on loss of habitats, estimates of how many species lived there and so will have been lost," he told Reuters. "Ours are more empirical -- those species we knew were there but cannot find."

There is no contradiction: As I said in my first response, the UN estimates what is going on biologically, whereas the list is a list of named species.

It's kind of silly for you to demand names of species that haven't been named. Analogy: If we go back through history and dig up records, I imagine that we could find no more than 50,000 names of people who lived and died before the year 1700 A.D. However, we can be pretty sure that there have been a lot more people who lived and died before 1700 A.D. than 50,000. But, by definition, I can't produce any names for you.

The extinct species are the same way: If they've gone extinct before they've been named, they'll likely never get named. That doesn't mean they never existed.

And what counts is the genetic diversity, the amount of variation in the global genetic pool, not the number of species that are listed in a book.

Neal J. King   ·  June 12, 2007 02:25 AM

Hi Neal. Suzuki is a geneticist that has been travelling around Canada and getting a lot of press here while preaching against AGW. Sherwood Idso was an adjunct professor in a three departments at Arizona State U including Botany and Microbiology. What authority does Hansen have on biological proccesses that produce methane? Apparently not much since he got it so wrong. And I am still waiting for you to prove the 13 year old study wrong.

About the temperatures, you seemed to miss my point. We linked to the same graph, but you gloss over the bumps in the red line. It is the bumps in that smoothing line that are most interesting. Like I said, the two largest most recent dips were around 1984 and 1991. Those were caused by volcano eruptions. The slight wiggle around 1999 was due to El Nino followed by El Nina. (That in itself is interesting, but I may get to that in another comment.) The top most recent values has the red line flattening out. Your smoothing line is indicating that the warming trend is decelerating. Since you did not answer my question in a specific way, I must assume you do not know what is causing the temps to taper off. My point is simple. This tapering off should not be happening if the warming was being caused by an accelerating level of CO2. Either another forcing is being overlooked or under rated, or AWG is not all it is made out to be.

jmrSudbury   ·  June 12, 2007 09:13 AM

Out of curiosity, I checked the difference between daily max and min for my city. On 2003-03-03, the max temp was 17.7 and the min temp was -31.7 for a difference of 49.4 C. The next two were:
1988-01-26 17.2 to -26.1 diff 43.3
2003-01-15 17.0 to -22.0 diff 39.0

Of 19,418 records, only 159 had a single day variablility of 20 degrees or more while more than half had 10 C or more. I was just curious.

John M Reynolds

jmrSudbury   ·  June 12, 2007 09:21 AM

Neal I read the whole article. Craig Hilton-Taylor felt obliged to give a big wet kiss to the climate change pornographers (probably noticed the flogging NASA chief Griffin got for not genuflecting to the climate change goon squad), but that doesn't erase the absurdity of claiming over half a million species have disappeared in the last twenty years.

Even now you are expressing confidence in this hogwash. Five hundred and twenty five thousand (525,000) species that have never been seen before or since. What are the odds of that?

You use to conceal your being a propagandist, now your not even trying.

Papertiger   ·  June 12, 2007 11:42 AM

John M. Reynolds,

- 13-year-old study: As I mentioned, it's not the study, it's the status of it. If it were a physics paper, I would take the issue on. But I don't trust my personal knowledge about biology: I know enough to know that you have to know an awful lot to stay on top of what goes on in that subject, because it changes a lot.

Sherwood Idso's education seems to be physics. I wouldn't place much confidence in the status of an adjunct position: I've known a few people who got those, and it's not hard to get.

I still don't know what you're harping on wrt Hansen & methane. He's well-known for going out on a limb on his 1989 prediction of GW - and getting it right. Please be a bit less cryptic.

My point about the graph: It's not even worth worrying about wiggles at that scale. I'll be worried about a trend if there's a decline for another 5 years. (Actually, in that case, I'll be over-joyed, not having to worry about GW. Unfortunately, I don't expect that to happen: Here's an update on the Antarctic.)

Neal J. King   ·  June 12, 2007 03:17 PM

Papertiger,

You're not making sense. There are lots of ways of estimating things that you don't get a chance to see directly. Just as it's possible to estimate the size of an ancient village by looking at its midden and garbage. People who do this for a living can always find some clever methods.

How can you be so sure that they cannot?

Neal J. King   ·  June 12, 2007 03:24 PM

Neal,

Let me get this straight. If a species wasn't named then its extinction wouldn't be counted?

So where do dinosaurs fit into that picture?

It is my understanding that they were named after they were extinct. Could that have been done in other cases if so desired?

M. Simon   ·  June 12, 2007 06:09 PM

M. Simon,

That's exactly my point: Papertiger seems to take the position that if a dinosaur doesn't have a name, it doesn't count as an extinction.

My point of view is that if we know there was a type of critter there, and it vanishes without the chance to leave descendants, it's gone extinct. And that is a loss of genetic diversity. The name is something we create for our own intellectual convenience: It's got nothing to do with the actuality of the genetic pool on the planet.

Neal J. King   ·  June 12, 2007 07:34 PM

Neal. My very first comment in this thread points to a pdf that critiques Hansen. That is the document to which I was referring with respect to methane. Here are two more:

Ice Sheet Disintegration: Hansen claimed that the sea level is rising at a rate of 3.5 cm per decade

"A good perspective on this issue is provided in the 16 March 2007 issue of Science by Shepherd and Wingham (2007)..." Their analyses "have yielded a diversity of values, ranging from an implied sea-level rise of 1.0 mm/year to a sea-level fall of 0.15 mm/year. Based on their evaluation of these diverse findings, the two researchers come to the conclusion that the current “best estimate” of the contribution of polar ice wastage to global sea level change is a rise of 0.35 millimeters per year, which over a century amounts to only 35 millimeters, or less than an inch and a half." Pg 4

Sea Level Trends: Hansen claimed that the rate of sea level rise is accelerating.

"Holgate [(2007)] calculated that the mean rate of global sea level rise was 'larger in the early part of the last century (2.03 ± 0.35 mm/year 1904-1953), in comparison with the latter part (1.45 ± 0.34 mm/year 1954-2003).'" Pg 5

Your NCAR link says the researchers derive the Palmer index for the period 1870-2002. That does not make sense. The Palmer index is better when working with large areas of uniform topography. Most places in the world are not areas of uniform topography. "[T]he Western states, with mountainous terrain and the resulting complex regional microclimates, find it useful to supplement Palmer values with other indices such as the Surface Water Supply Index, which takes snowpack and other unique conditions into account." ( http://drought.unl.edu/whatis/indices.htm ) To use the Palmer index for the globe will not yield accurate results. At the end of the article, they end up admitting a major cause of the droughts: "In contrast, rainfall deficits alone were the main factor behind expansion of dry soils in Africa's Sahel and East Asia. These are regions where El Niño, a more frequent visitor since the 1970s, tends to inhibit precipitation."

John M Reynolds

jmrSudbury   ·  June 13, 2007 12:10 AM

So much for dinosaurs. When we find them we name them.

How many of the 500,000 missing species have been found and named?

One would be a start.

M. Simon   ·  June 13, 2007 03:07 AM

Why not claim 10 trillion missing species?

After all none of them have been found either.

We are talking global warming here.

You know what missing species I worry about most? The calibration records of the weather stations.

M. Simon   ·  June 13, 2007 03:13 AM

M. Simon:

- Missing species: So now you claim that biologists, who've been working in the field, don't know how to estimate how much genetic diversity there is, or how to estimate die out. Or are they also a part of the great GW conspiracy? It seems like the only scientists you have faith in are the ones that get unfunded, like Bussard.

- Weather stations: Have you looked into the history of weather stations? But, anyway, these are the tools we have. Science is detective work: There's no point in complaining about the evidence left, any more than a detective should complain that the murderer didn't leave a signed confession. People who installed the first weather stations were certainly not planning to take over the free world by laying the groundwork for a GW story.

Neal J. King   ·  June 13, 2007 03:24 AM

M. Simon:

Your algorithm for "disproof" is the same as Papertiger's:

"Find a name for a species that no one has ever had the chance to find. You can't, so that must mean there are no species that no one has ever found."

An analogy: I visit an island where the population is wasting away due to a plague. Because of the general poverty and dispiritedness, for public records, no one has done more than count the bodies that die each day, over the last 30 years. On that basis, I can calculate a death toll of 10,000. Maybe I can verify the number by investigating graveyard activity.

But I'm never going to be able to name the dead. That doesn't mean they didn't exist, or didn't die.

Neal J. King   ·  June 13, 2007 03:32 AM

Neal,

With 500,000 missing shouldn't we have at least 1 data point out of the 500,000?

So you are saying we need to fall in line with bad data because it is all we have?

That is not very scientific.

Especially if the errors in the data exceed the signal we are looking for. Just to get a handle on how bad the situation is how about calibration records for one station for the last ten years. That would at least give us one data point.

Tell you what though. I'm an instrument designer. I estimate the errors after 10 years of no calibration will be around +/- 3 deg F. Prove me wrong.

M. Simon   ·  June 13, 2007 03:37 AM

M. Simon:

- I'm not a biologist dealing in dying species. As Deutsch said, "The most sensible thing that a scientist can do when dealing with an area outside of his realm of expertise is to accept what the consensus of specialists say, as being most likely correct." (Go back and view the video in your "chemical scum" posting.)

- I'm also not in charge of weather stations. Why don't you approach one of those folks?

Neal J. King   ·  June 13, 2007 03:46 AM

Out of 500,000 missing species certainly the people involved could find 1 data point.

BTW what is the confidence interval for the 500,000 number? +/- 100,000? +/- 300,000? +/- 450,000? +/- 499,999? for 95% confidence?

How was the estimate made? PIOOMA?

M. Simon   ·  June 13, 2007 03:49 AM

John M Reynolds:

You cite Idso & Idso citing Shepherd & Wingham:
"A good perspective on this issue is provided in the 16 March 2007 issue of Science by Shepherd and Wingham (2007)..." Their analyses "have yielded a diversity of values, ranging from an implied sea-level rise of 1.0 mm/year to a sea-level fall of 0.15 mm/year. Based on their evaluation of these diverse findings, the two researchers come to the conclusion that the current "best estimate" of the contribution of polar ice wastage to global sea level change is a rise of 0.35 millimeters per year, which over a century amounts to only 35 millimeters, or less than an inch and a half."

Now, when I go to Shepherd & Wingham directly, the abstract says:

"Recent Sea-Level Contributions of the Antarctic and Greenland Ice Sheets,
Andrew Shepherd and Duncan Wingham

After a century of polar exploration, the past decade of satellite measurements has painted an altogether new picture of how Earth's ice sheets are changing. As global temperatures have risen, so have rates of snowfall, ice melting, and glacier flow. Although the balance between these opposing processes has varied considerably on a regional scale, data show that Antarctica and Greenland are each losing mass overall. Our best estimate of their combined imbalance is about 125 gigatons per year of ice, enough to raise sea level by 0.35 millimeters per year. This is only a modest contribution to the present rate of sea-level rise of 3.0 millimeters per year. However, much of the loss from Antarctica and Greenland is the result of the flow of ice to the ocean from ice streams and glaciers, which has accelerated over the past decade. In both continents, there are suspected triggers for the accelerated ice discharge--surface and ocean warming, respectively--and, over the course of the 21st century, these processes could rapidly counteract the snowfall gains predicted by present coupled climate models."

That doesn't sound so good, does it? It seems to me that Idso & Idso are quoting that paper out of context, against its intended meaning. . This gives me reason to distrust them as a source: there seems to be an active attempt to distort the meaning of other people's work.

Neal J. King   ·  June 13, 2007 04:07 AM

Neal,

3.0 mm per year is a very dangerous rate.

That is about an inch every 8 years and a foot in a century.

Can you just imagine all the people drowned by that tidal wave? It could be billions.

M. Simon   ·  June 13, 2007 05:07 AM

Andrew Shepherd and Duncan Wingham studied polar ice melting and came up with a best guess of 0.35 mm per year. Then they said, "This is only a modest contribution to the present rate of sea-level rise of 3.0 millimeters per year." From where do they suddenly get the 3.0 mm per year? As page 5 of the pdf shows, Holgate has the sea level rising only 1.45 ± 0.34 mm/year 1954-2003. That is less than half of this 3.0 mm. Them pulling a number out of their hats "gives me reason to distrust them as a source." Idso and Idso simply quoted the data at which the study looked. I would not have commented on their suggestion of 3.0 mm when they do not back it up.

They even suggest that the flow of ice to the ocean from ice streams and glaciers has accelerated over the past decade even though the global sea level has been decelerating. That confirms that thermal expansion is indeed what is causing the global sea level rise to decelerate. Since it is not thermal expansion, and not polar ice, then what makes up for the rest of the 3.0 mm? Or was that just for funding purposes?

Their last sentence is suspect as well. I would like to know what the suspected triggers are and what the r2 value is on the possibility that the "processes could rapidly counteract the snowfall gains predicted by present coupled climate models." We know the climate models are not accurate, so I think we already have that answer.

jmrSudbury   ·  June 13, 2007 10:59 AM

M. Simon,

As discussed previously, my personal concern is for the impact on the biosphere's genetic diversity. Sea-level rise does not loom as large - although there are a few islands that are only a couple of meters over sea-level, and will be affected to a degree greatly exceeding the average rise.

Neal J. King   ·  June 13, 2007 04:42 PM

John M Reynolds,

- I don't have access to the full article by Shepherd & Wingham, so I can't comment on anything beyond the abstract. If you would care to provide it to me...

- If you don't trust the source, that doesn't mean that it's appropriate to quote the source out of context: You should be upfront and say, "Shepherd & Wingham say XXX, but I think that there is a problem with their interpretation of their own data. I think the real meaning is X." You should not say, "Shepherd & Wingham imply X." Because this implies that Shepherd & Wingham would support your statement X, even though it contradicts their actual statement XXX.

Neal J. King   ·  June 13, 2007 04:55 PM

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

Papertiger   ·  June 14, 2007 01:46 AM

Papertiger,

There is clear evidence that Idso & Idso are quoting a source against its own "message", as demonstrated in its own abstract.

Whereas there is lack of evidence that Idso & Idso could be right although their source is wrong. In other words, How could Idso & Idso see very far by standing on the shoulders of midgets? Either they should agree that their evidence-providers are "giants" or else they should find someone else's shoulders to stand upon.

Neal J. King   ·  June 14, 2007 03:02 AM

Lets see I found a paper by Wayne et al. (2002), who grew common ragweed plants (Ambrosia artemisiifolia L.) in controlled-environment glasshouses maintained at ambient (350 ppm) and enriched (700 ppm) atmospheric CO2 concentrations. He found that "stand-level pollen production was 61% higher in elevated versus ambient CO2 environments."
Conclusion- Raised CO2 increased the health of plants, the basic food source for all critters.
How is it possible that co2 makes plants healthy and literally more fruitful and at the same time kills off 500,000 species that use same plants as food?

Tuljapurkar et al. examined mortality over the period 1950-1994 in the G7 countries - Canada, France, Germany (excluding the former East Germany), Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

The authors found that "in every country over this period, mortality at each age has declined exponentially at a roughly constant rate."

In a commentary on the work of Tuljapurkar et al., Horiuchi notes that the average lifespan of early humans was approximately 20 years, but that in the major industrialized countries it is now about 80 years, with the bulk of this increase having come in the past 150 years. He then notes that "it was widely expected that as life expectancy became very high and approached the 'biological limit of human longevity,' the rapid 'mortality decline' would slow down and eventually level off," but he states the now obvious fact that "such a deceleration has not occurred."

It appears that in countries with highly developed market economies, such as the G7 nations, where good health care is readily available, deaths of infants, children and young adults have been dramatically reduced over the last century or so, to the point where average life expectancy is now largely determined by what happens to elderly people; and it is evident that under these circumstances, the elderly are living longer and longer with the passing of time. It is further evident that this latter phenomenon - which is an empirical reality - is likely due to ever-improving health in older people, which in turn is likely the result of continuing improvements in their bodily systems for repairing cellular damage caused by degenerative processes associated with old age.
Since these observations are common to all G7 nations, they must be the result of an ubiquitous phenomenon that is occurring simultaneously all across the earth and increasing in impact with the passing of time.
The first thing that comes to our minds in this regard is the historical and ongoing rise in the air's CO2 content. Research in this area has been very limited, however; and little is known about the effects of atmospheric CO2 enrichment on human-health-promoting substances in plants. A few studies have observed small increases in plant vitamin A and C concentrations in response to increases in the air's CO2 concentration; and a couple have identified CO2-induced increases in plant constituents proven to be effective in fighting a number of different human cancers, as well as cardiac insufficiency. One of these studies is highlighted in another of our Journal Reviews: CO2 Enhances Plant Production of Cancer-Fighting Substances. As more research results of this nature are published, we will be sure to highlight them in view of the intriguing possibility that the documented increases in longevity among the elderly living in countries of developed market economies may actually be due to the historical and ongoing rise in the air's CO2 content.

How is it possible that a naturally occuring substance, which increases the health of the biosphere universally, can be labeled a pollutant?

Papertiger   ·  June 14, 2007 05:46 AM

Papertiger. Did the Wayne et al. (2002) paper maintain a constant temperature? Oh, and I really liked your last question. -- John M Reynolds

jmrSudbury   ·  June 14, 2007 09:50 AM

It wasn't literally a "paper". I suppose the Wayne et al. bits and bites maintained a constant temperature.

Papertiger   ·  June 14, 2007 11:16 AM

Papertiger,

I really don't see any contradiction:

- Just as turning up the heat in a greenhouse will help some plants and harm other plants, turning up the heat on the Earth (by adding C-O2) will help some plants and harm some flora & fauna. From the point of view of biodiversity, the problem is that you don't gain more species, you just get more of some existing species; whereas you will lose quite a few of the other species that exist today.

- Whether you want to call C-O2 a pollutant or not is simply a vocabulary issue.

Neal J. King   ·  June 14, 2007 01:07 PM

Neal,

Oxygen is a poisonous gas. It kills anerobic bacteria.

We must reduce its concentration in the atmosphere by 50%. To save the bacteria. Think of all the habitat change too much oxygen is causing. Species could die. Millions of them.

M. Simon   ·  June 14, 2007 01:41 PM

M. Simon,

You're proposing radical change: Get rid of oxygen.

I'm proposing to be conservative: Leave things the way they are.

Funny, isn't it?

Neal J. King   ·  June 14, 2007 04:53 PM

Cutting CO2 output by 50% in 50 years is pretty radical.

M. Simon   ·  June 14, 2007 05:01 PM

Neal J. How old are you?
How is it you don't understand that if not for the increased abundance of ambiant CO2, you most likely wouldn't have survived past the age of 40.
Willful blindness.

Still waiting for that extinction report from you; since your last post three more animal species that no one has ever seen, heard, smelled or studied, have dissappeared. {Big Foot, Sasquatch, and Yeti would be my guess}

The supposed harm involved in enhanced co2 is illusory and not easily defined even with biases built into the detection apparatus.

The benefits of enhanced CO2 are obvious and pronounced.

CO2 as a pollutant? You might as well argue water is a pollutant.

Water as pollutant.
It's deadly to breath.
Prolonged exposure increases the likelyhood of illness.
It breaks down infrastructure, causes bridges to collapse, destroys crops, promotes hazardous molds and rot, causes rust.


Simon did you know that when all sources are tabulated, oxygen is the most abundant element in the biosphere. Oxygen makes up 46.6 % of the Earth's crust { Life: Science of Biology - page 25 table 1, Abundance of some chemical elements as percentage of Earth's crust.

Papertiger   ·  June 14, 2007 06:02 PM

Papertiger,

100 years ago, C-O2 was about 30% lower in concentration.

People were not dying at age 40 at that time.

So I think you're conflating things again...

Neal J. King   ·  June 14, 2007 08:00 PM

Neal
Forty years was the average lifespan for an American in 1850.

Only took 30% more CO2 to double the average lifespan.

If we bump it to 45% we could live into our hundreds.

Papertiger   ·  June 14, 2007 09:14 PM

Neal,

Buckminster Fuller in a number of his books equated "energy slaves" with human well being.

Since, for the time being, energy production is related to CO2 production human well being will correlate with CO2 production.

M. Simon   ·  June 14, 2007 11:21 PM

A few years ago in Canada, parliment decided to classify CO2 as a toxin. As a pollutant, it was suddenly subjected to regulations to which it did not qualify before.

I have no problem quoting someone based on their research. When they go beyond that research and pull a number from some unknown source, then I don't feel compelled to quote that. It is true, I prefer to go with the facts and not the fiction. I am funny that way I guess.

John M Reynolds

jmrSudbury   ·  June 15, 2007 12:00 AM

Papertiger,
If adding more C-O2 to your respirational diet would increase one's lifespan, there would already be people living in higher-CO2-concentration tanks. I haven't heard of any.

In general, the big improvements in civilization that have helped lifespan involve hygiene and sanitation. There's no reason we can't continue to get those while reducing our production of C-O2.

M. Simon:
Correlation of that sort doesn't provide useful policy direction. During ancient times, owning real slaves was also highly correlated with personal well-being - and for obvious reasons. Nonetheless, we've managed to move humanity beyond that correlation. We can, and I believe, must, do the same with C-O2.

John M Reynold:
If you don't trust someone's research, why quote them at all? To quote them in contradiction to their intended meaning is intellectually risky. Especially when you don't tell your reader that this is in fact what you are doing.

Neal J. King   ·  June 15, 2007 03:19 AM

Heightened ambiant CO2 increases the health of plants. Food stuff from healthier plants is healthier for people and animals to eat. Even the carnivores benefit indirectly because their prey are eating better quality food.
Let me make myself explicitly clear. The additional anthropogenic CO2 is the main factor involved with longer lifespan.
Sanitation and medical advances reduce infant and adolesent deaths, but is the improvement that CO2 conveys to plants that is keeping people healthy in their old age.
This is what I believe.

I think a 1 degree rise in temperature is a good trade for an extra fourty years.
What do you think?

The wonderful thing about the increased lifespan is that as the co2 increases the lifespan increases with no plateau in sight.
We might just have us an open ended deal.
Makes me wonder if the story of Methusellah was real.


Papertiger   ·  June 15, 2007 06:44 AM

Neal said, "If you don't trust someone's research, why quote them at all?"

I agree. I do trust their research. I have no problem quoting them based on their research. I do have trouble quoting them when they say that their best guess based on their research is incorrect and supplant their best guess with some other unqualified number.

Neal said, "To quote them in contradiction to their intended meaning is intellectually risky."

Agreed. I did not. Their research provided proof that lead them to their best guess. The intellectual risk was assumed by them when they decided to add an unqualified datum to their conclusions.

Neal said, "Especially when you don't tell your reader that this is in fact what you are doing."

While this is only a sentence fragment, I do understand its meaning based on Neal's previous sentence. I agree with this as well. The researchers did not tell the reader what they were doing with the 3.0 number. As I said, they did assume a risk by not indicating from whence the 3.0 number came.

I am glad we are finally in agreement.

John M Reynolds

jmrSudbury   ·  June 15, 2007 07:39 AM

Neal says:

Correlation of that sort doesn't provide useful policy direction. During ancient times, owning real slaves was also highly correlated with personal well-being - and for obvious reasons. Nonetheless, we've managed to move humanity beyond that correlation. We can, and I believe, must, do the same with C-O2.

Moving from real slaves to energy slaves is a move up. Currently the only way to reduce CO2 sans an economic replacement would be to revert to human slavery. Not a good idea. IMO.

The way to solve the CO2 "problem" then is to reduce the cost of the alternatives. i.e. instead of putting money into CO2 mitigation it should go to reducing the cost of wind, solar voltaics, electrical storage, and probably a bigger side bet on various fusion possibilities.

Raising the cost of "energy slaves" only makes human slavery more economic. Not a good idea IMO.

M. Simon   ·  June 15, 2007 12:03 PM

Papertiger,

Let me add that better sanitation requires energy in most places. For pumping water and treating sewage.

So even the longer life span due to advances in waste treatment is currently dependent on increased CO2 output aside from any beneficial effect increased CO2 has on plants.

I'm not willing to kill 100s of millions to prevent a few deg C rise in global temperature. Such a trade off seems immoral to me.

M. Simon   ·  June 15, 2007 12:12 PM

M. Simon,

I'll agree with you on the need for alternatives that don't produce C-O2. You have never heard me (or read me) suggesting that "freezing in the dark" is a plausible solution.

JMR:

As I said before, if you don't trust them, why quote them? Trust is a matter of integrity: You don't trust someone for 95% of their scientific integrity and distrust them for 5%. If I didn't trust someone's scientific intent, I wouldn't trust any part of their work.

That doesn't mean that I expect any scientist to be 100% right: I've never met anyone who was, and I've known a couple of heavy hitters. But I do expect him/her to be trying to be right 100% of the time.

Neal J. King   ·  June 15, 2007 02:27 PM

Neal, I finally understand why you are confused by my willingness to quote their work. You are working on an invalid assumption. You assume that I mistrust them for 95% of their scientific integrity. That is incorrect. Like I said before, they did a lot of work on their study and came up with their best guess. That is at least 95% of their work. They then, for some reason, decide to throw out that work and substitute their best guess with a much higher number. That is the questionable 5%. It is questionable since they did not say from whence that number came. -- John M Reynolds

jmrSudbury   ·  June 15, 2007 04:04 PM

JMR,

I think you misinterpreted my expression: Let me state it in the first person:

In my opinion, it is inappropriate to trust someone for 95% of their material, in terms of scientific integrity, but to distrust that person for 5%.

If they cannot be trusted for that 5%, I would not trust them for the remainder; no matter how knowledgeable or intelligent they may be.

Knowledge and skills can be incomplete, but they are also correctable. But basic scientific honesty & integrity cannot be incomplete: It is 100% or nothing.

I can forgive someone for making a technical error (although I will watch him more carefully thereafter). I cannot forgive someone for lying to me, or for guessing while telling me he is certain.

Neal J. King   ·  June 15, 2007 06:57 PM

Neal,

The short version: data good, conclusion not supported by data.

M. Simon   ·  June 15, 2007 07:50 PM

Mischenko et al (2007) presents a plot of the global monthly average of the column aerosol optical thickness (AOT) of the atmosphere that stretches from August 1981 to June 2005, which they developed from what they describe as "the longest uninterrupted record of global satellite estimates of the column AOT over the oceans, the Global Aerosol Climatology Project (GACP) record."

We agree that the satellite record is the gold standard.
The GACP record of the globally averaged column AOT over the world's oceans. Adapted from Mischenko et al. (2007).
This record was derived from "the International Satellite Cloud Climatology Project (ISCCP) DX radiance data set," which is "composed of calibrated and sampled Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer radiances."
In discussing their results, Mischenko et al. note that "observations of downward solar radiation fluxes at earth's surface have shown a recovery from the previous decline known as global 'dimming', with the 'brightening' beginning around 1990." Their AOT record harmonizes with these observations, as well as with estimated trends in primary anthropogenic emissions of SO2 and black carbon, which they say are known to "contribute substantially to the global AOT."
These several facts raise serious questions about attributions of late-20th-century global warming to the concomitant increase in the atmosphere's CO2 concentration, for as noted by Stanhill (2007), the changes in the flux of solar radiation received at the surface of the earth as a consequence of the global dimming and brightening phenomena far exceed the changes in longwave radiative forcing produced by historical changes in the air's CO2 content; and these observations would appear to relegate anthropogenic CO2 emissions to a much less important role in terms of their ability to elicit significant changes in earth's surface temperature.

Stanhill noted there was -

"a widespread reduction in solar radiation at the earth's surface, often referred to as global dimming," which "lasted from the mid-1950s until the mid-1980s when a recovery, referred to as global brightening, started." This dimming over the land surface of the globe led to a 20 W/m2 reduction in Eg��, between 1958 and 1992, which negative shortwave forcing, in his words, was "far greater than the 2.4 W/m2 increase in the positive longwave radiative forcing estimated to have occurred since the industrial era as a result of fossil and biofuel combustion," which latter forcing, he notes, is "what provides the consensus explanation of global warming."

I feel vindicated.

Papertiger   ·  June 16, 2007 12:47 AM

Papertiger,

Your first link is bad. Post the correct link and I will fix it.

M. Simon   ·  June 16, 2007 12:56 AM

One of those Mr. Wizard type experiments you can do at home to confirm that there is a reduction in Aerosol Optical Thickness. Put a pan of water in a location that is exposed to sunlight all day long. Measure the amount of water that evaporates and log the result.
You should end up with more evaporation over time.

PS - My results were tragicly skewwed by the dog.
So I moved the experiment to the roof, where my results were further skewwed by the cat.

Working on it.

Papertiger   ·  June 16, 2007 07:23 AM

M. Simon:

If you quote someone's data but not their analysis, you'd better do it upfront.

Acceptable form: "Dr. X measured this & that. They conclude A; but I think a better interpretation would be B."

Bad form:
- "The eminent Dr. X measured this & that, and the result is B."
- When challenged about what Dr. X actually said, "Oh, right, he didn't actually say B, he said A. But he would have said B, if he'd been honest or had his screwed on at the time."

If you're gonna stand on somebody's shoulders, don't wait until later to tell me that he's just a midget.

Neal J. King   ·  June 16, 2007 08:41 AM

Papertiger,

Stanhill & CO2 Science

I checked out your reference to CO2 Science, and found this interesting quote:
"Reporting that 'the cause of these large changes in Eg↓, is not known,' but that they totally dwarf the change in longwave radiative forcing claimed to be responsible for 20th-century global warming, Stanhill goes on to further report that 'no reference to these findings has appeared in the three massive IPCC [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change] assessment reports published during the past 15 years,' which glaring omission, in his words, 'is surprising in view of the important practical consequences of changes in Eg↓, in addition to their theoretical significance for climate change.'"

I will point out that I have found in the IPCC AR4:
- Box 3.2: The Dimming of the Planet and Apparent Conflicts in Trends of Evaporation and Pan Evaporation. (page 279, Chapter 3)
- Explicit reference to Stanhill & Cohen, 2001: Global dimming, a review of the evidence for a widespread and significant reduction in global radiation with a discussion of its probable causes and possible agricultural consequences.

So either:
- CO2 Science are actually lying about what Stanhill said; or
- Stanhill hasn't been able to read the IPCC's AR4; or
- The situation is actually a lot more nuanced than CO2 Science is claiming, and they're making a mountain out of a molehill.

Unfortunately, I haven't been able to get a look at the actual paper (beyond the abstract), because you need an AGU subscription. (If a paper takes a strong position on something, it's always worthwhile to go beyond the summary: The whole point of the abstract is to catch the eye, so often the abstract is a lot more dramatic than the real paper.)

In short, Papertiger, I wouldn't feel vindicated yet if I were you.

I hope you don't tragicly skew your dog or cat.

Neal J. King   ·  June 16, 2007 08:57 AM

Dog and Cat are quite well, thank you.

I really hate that pay per view gate the science people put on their work.
Seems to me, if they are going to play God in our politics, threatening to reorder our society on slim information and conjecture, then they should be subject to full disclosure.
Lord knows we can't rely on reporters to read the crap for us.
Perhaps a new legislation is in order?

Papertiger   ·  June 16, 2007 10:01 AM

Papertiger,

I'm sympathetic to your point of view on this one. The problem is not the scientists, but the journals: They are private enterprises, so they recoup their expenses for publication (which includes managing the reviewing process, editing, etc.) by charging for subscriptions.

I think most university libraries pay for these, so if you're at the site of the library of a major university, you can probably get anything. Also, some people put out their papers in pre-print form. And, my impression is that, when the paper has gotten old enough, the journals don't care so much if it gets out in some other way. But my impression is that it takes 6 months to a year.

Neal J. King   ·  June 16, 2007 02:35 PM

Neal, AR4 is not one of the "three massive" assessment reports. Check your quote again.

jmrSudbury   ·  June 19, 2007 11:15 AM

Post a comment

You may use basic HTML for formatting.





Remember Me?

(you may use HTML tags for style)



July 2007
Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
8 9 10 11 12 13 14
15 16 17 18 19 20 21
22 23 24 25 26 27 28
29 30 31        

ANCIENT (AND MODERN)
WORLD-WIDE CALENDAR


Search the Site


E-mail




Classics To Go

Classical Values PDA Link



Archives




Recent Entries



Links



Site Credits