BPSDB
- New and improved old memes
- New debunkings
- Arctic Update
New and improved old memes
2008 will probably be 10th Hottest year since 1880. Of course that is not how the Guardian reported it, they said “2008 will be coolest year of the decade“, but in this case those are the same thing.
Already the Deniers are spreading the “coolest of the decade” (ie ‘Climate change has ended‘) meme, a classic example of how the Deniers want you to look at the data, but not too closely.
Three things they do NOT want you to look at in this case:
1) Obviously they don’t want you to look at the past 130 years where it is quite clear it’s still pretty freaking hot.
2) As discussed in the last blog post (and before), they do not want you to look at how the steady increase in temperature is made up of new record highs followed by short cooler periods;
3) They absolutely do NOT want you to look at the huge difference between where the global temperature anomaly is, and where it would be if we were not experiencing anthropogenic climate change.
Since the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) is in the cool La Nina phase (and here) and Solar activity has been at a minimum we should actually be in a cool period with very low temperatures globally, not near record hot. I have no idea how low the anomaly ‘should be’ naturally, but almost definitely 0.0 to -0.5 somewhere.
Regardless of the facts we can expect the Denialosphere to continue spinning this as further “proof” that the climate change that isn’t happening has ended, or incoherence to that effect.
Sea Levels
Of course Deniers are always trying to spin short term fluctuations as significant even the absurdity of it is apparent in the material they present. “Watts Up WithThat” give’s us “Satellite derived sea level updated- short term trend has been shrinking since 2005.“
Strictly speaking that title is true. Equally accurate titles would have been “Satellite derived sea level updated – normal variation in rising trend as expected”, or perhaps “Trivial fluctuations that mean nothing continue.”
If anything his “shrinking trend” is less significant than the ones 1994-1997 and late 1998 to 2001 and they had no influence on the real trend, as anyone can see by just looking at the graph.
Unfortunately Watts is probably correct in thinking that by giving it the headline that he did and drawing peoples attention only to the 2005-present fluctuation, most will leave with the impression that there has been some sort of reversal in the long term trend.
Climate Models
I expect that the “Models are Flawed” meme is going to take new force thanks to an unfortunate interview of Lenny Smith by Fred Pearce in New Scientist. “Are climate scientists overselling their models?” is a perfectly legitimate question to ask, and to publish on.
However, it seems to me that the rather informal dialogue lends itself to significant abuse. Initially Smith is not talking about the models themselves so much as the public perception of what the models can and can’t do. If I am reading it correctly his critique is not about the models accuracy, but rather their precision.
I think most people treat the two terms as near synonyms and muddle their meaning, but the difference is critical. For example, if I say the Sun is about 149 million kilometers from Earth I am being accurate, but imprecise. If I say it is exactly 149,141,592.65358979323846 million meters from Earth I am being very precise, but completely inaccurate.
Not that I disagree with Smith. He is absolutely right in stating “Effective application of climate science hinges on clear communication of which results we believe are robust and which are not”, and that the “…future warming could be greater or less than what is suggested by the diversity between models in the report.” I just think we need to bookmark that latter quote when this is inevitably cited as an ‘admission that the models are nonsense’.
UPDATE: Daily Mail right on cue “‘Climate change forecasters do not know how global warming will affect the world,’ top physicist claims.” Don’t these people have editors?
New debunkings
There is a new and most welcome series at Youtube coming from poster greenman3610 from a show “Changing Planet” by Peter Sinclair: Climate Denial Argument of the Month
The Solar Myth debunked
The 1970s Cooling Myth debunked
The curious may also want to check out Carbon Dioxide and Climate Scientific American July 1959 and1953 Popular Mechanics article about global warming.
Favourite these, post them to your social networks, and post them in wherever you encounter the myth in question. I am looking forward to many more (I hope).
There is also postings of the show itself. This first one does a nice job on the “Arcitic Ice is Growing” myth:
Arctic update
Which is a segue to some very bad news about the Arctic, viz confirmation of the continued ice loss, and in a different study, what appears to be a fundamental change in the winds and currents which is accelerating ice loss. The paper in the Geophysical Research Letters is reported in Spiegel International as “Point of No Return for the Arctic Climate?”
A bleak picture indeed – don’t forget to help turn that around by posting and sharing the debunks I mention here. Thanks.
We give our consent every moment that we do not resist.
Denier “Challenge” aka Deathwatch Update: Day 56 … still no evidence.
IMAGE CREDITS:
And I Thought Yesterday Was Hot! by Cayusa
Global and Hemispheric Temperature – Annual Global HadCRUT University of East Anglia
Deniers are fools and fools are guilty for being a fool. Everyone has a brain to think. Damn the deniers.
Mike, the post has a reference to the PDO that I suspect should be to ENSO instead.
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And on a related note, it’s not “El” Nina.
Interesting topic nonetheless.
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Climate change is real. Global warming, however, is a complete hoax used to instill a carbon tax on the American people. Watch out folks.
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See comment here
Buried. Propoganda. Come on people… you are all being duped. Temperature has always been crazy and you can’t actually measure anything significant about this type of thing in 130 years. Am I expected to believe that global warming has been happening this long? It’s climate change. It’s normal. These people are not.
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See comment here
It’s all bull. Global warming is a scam and doing anything about it will make 0 difference
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[…] globally, not near record hot. Climate change / global warming is real and it’s now. read more | digg story Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a […]
[…] 2008 será probablemente el décimo año más caliente desde 1880 (ING)greenfyre.wordpress.com/2008/12/05/2008-will-probably-be-10t… por jm22381 hace pocos segundos […]
Using the word ‘deniers’ to describe people who question AGW is bad form. [1] AGW proponents who are hysterically, irrationally entrenched in their position use this word as code for ‘exactly lilke holocaust deniers’. It is bad style to use it if you rely only on the facts, ‘science’ to back up your claims. If you have no emotional axe to grind, and are a true scientist, you do not use loaded, emotional and hysterical language like ‘deniers’. Period. Stick to the facts as you know them, and leave out the Psi-op tactics. It makes for a cleaner presentation. [2]
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Nice fruity graphs. Let’s put aside the obvious fact that humanity didn’t have sensitive enough equipment to even measure global temperatures sooner than 5 yrs ago [and the ones we have now are suspect in their accuracy], thus making it an apples to oranges comparison, the fact of the matter is that the graph shows wild fluctuations just in the graph. Who is this jerk to say what temperature is optimal? This ‘0’ on his graph? When he answers the frank question of how many people die from cold related temperatures then he can make justifications of why it should be colder than it is now [significantly more people are killed by cold than warm]. And one last point, we are not ‘denier’s we are anthropogenic warming atheists. It’s an important difference. This is an irrational cult and has all the makings of religion. You have a prophet [al gore], holy men [scientists], garden of eden [no humanity, just greenery], armageddon [‘Day after Tomorrow’ anyone?], heretics [deniers], and of course the faithful [this jerk].
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Not sure whether its true or not, but in the end
– I’m all for cleaner energy sources and cleaner air, regardless of whether it cools the planet down or not.
– I’m also all for CHEAPER energy sources, means lower bills to pay.
Good morning
With the exception of some wise words from Kazi and Dazzer, the above posts deny the climate science and repetitively challenge what can and has been shown to be crap.
I say the ‘posts deny’, but of course, I mean the people writing them. Why not call a spade a spade? The behaviour of denying is attached to the person doing it.
While I appreciate that the term ‘denier’ has been associated with a denial of the Holocaust, that is not its only meaning and is not even its general meaning.
The term ‘denier’ is descriptive of anyone who is in serious denial about a serious problem, and it suggests negative effects i.e., the person has caused or will cause serious harm to others (and often to themselves). Harm can be by commission or omission. One can see why it might be unpleasant to be described this way. Nonetheless, abuses of all sorts are often denied, and these abusers are deniers.
For example, pedophiles are almost always ‘deniers’ of their crimes against children. I am not, of course, suggesting a comparison between climate change deniers and pedophiles. However, both fail to take responsibility and talk about how everyone else is lying. Actually, they often feel they are the victims of something.
Those who deny human-caused climate change may simply not understand the science or the implications of climate change.
However, more often than not, those who are being called ‘deniers’ are rather oviously part of the industry status quo. Among these are the individuals who spend a lot of time promoting anti-green, free-market rhetoric. They are paranoid and they sound like they have guns.
In contrast, the balanced, current, thoughtfully reviewed climate science information regularly provided here is helpful to building an informed, confident citizenry.
I wonder if GreenFyre or a guest could talk about examples from history that show some successes of the environmental movement. Otherwise, we can’t see the possibilities for change.
Our current situation exists only because we created it. That means we can change it, but we have to have a vision of what should replace the existing economic spectacle of mindless usurpation and consumption. Of course, the societies oppressed by our colonial consumption habits will bring it down for us, if we can’t change. Some are already miles ahead of us and have the structures in place for change.
But thank you to the deniers for highlighting all this.
Each one teach one. 🙂
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I wonder if GreenFyre or a guest could talk about examples from history that show some successes of the environmental movement. Otherwise, we can’t see the possibilities for change.
Two nominations: The Montreal Protocol and the Acid Rain Program.
The Montreal Protocol was not only a successful international environmental agreement, but it has been called “the single most successful international agreement to date” (Kofi Annan’s words). It also has some fun denialist tactics associated with it — for instance, our good friend S. Fred Singer wrote vehemently against the impact of CFCs on the ozone layer and published his magnum opus on the subject in 1995. Look up the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for that year.
Although the Acid Rain Program isn’t international, it’s significant here because it was the model for carbon cap-and-trade. Note that the biggest failures so far of the European system are where it deviated from the Acid Rain Program’s model (i.e. it gave away too many permits for free).
There is not MILLIONS OF SCIENTISTS, especially reputable ones, that believe in this Faery Tale you and your ilk espouse.
Damn all Global Warming Believers.
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HotHead: The facts would beg to differ.
Brian D
Thanks for these examples.
What networks and structures would you say were in place, in these examples? What forces helped create success?
M
The earth has been warming for 10,000 years and I’m damn grateful. My real concern would be a reversal in this trend. The tropics I can deal.[1]
P.S. why is it always the liberals that find the need to insult those that disagree with their thinking? How many calm rational “deniers” refused audience on the benefits of nuclear power? How many angry liberals attaced those that in 1989 correctly argued the fallacy of AIDS being a major epidemic that would wipe out the earth?
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Tom: On the flipside, why do those who deny scientific results tend to be conservative ideologues? Many of the AGW Deniers (capital D) are also spreading the DDT ban myth (“Rachel Carson killed more people than Hitler!”), and several overlapped with CFC-Ozone denial or more famously tobacco-cancer denial. (S. Fred Singer’s the best example, having argued strongly on all of these points.)
As I asked in other threads, why did these libertarians/conservatives decide to attack the science rather than accept the science and develop a small-government solution to the problem?
I suspect that climate issues only seem “liberal” because you’ll find precious few conservative/libertarian solutions being presented.
(On a side note, James Hansen is a self-described “middle of the road conservative” and is on record for saying he would have voted McCain in ’04 if he was running. I don’t think you can say that he’s ideologically motivated when he suggests things like cap-and-dividend as a part of the solution.)
As for nuclear power, I haven’t been involved in those debates. All of my research into the field shows that it’s just too expensive and slow, not to mention unduly centralized (i.e. a welcoming terror target). It holds roughly a fifth of the US electricity market after decades of use and STILL requires government handouts to remain competitive. You find folk who know much more about business than I, such as Warren Buffet, pulling the plug on nuclear projects after sinking millions in feasability studies. You find construction timelines being on the order of ten years before it begins producing a single kilowatt, which is too long to have a serious impact on climate issues (although I haven’t looked into the carbon footprint of concrete-heavy nuclear plant construction).
LONG before you begin getting into the traditional environmentalist concerns on nuclear power (notably safety and waste disposal), it falls into the “not satisfactory” category. I agree it will be part of the solution, but it isn’t the magic bullet the conservatives seem to think it is. (On a side note, was I the only one laughing when the party that developed “Freedom Fries” started asking why America couldn’t be more like France as soon as nuclear power came up?)
There are many questionable statements made, but let’s start with #1:
How many global temperature monitoring stations were there in 1878? How about 1900? I know, these are foolish questions. But how foolish is it to quote temperatures from 1878. I would agree we have fairly accurate readings from the last 30 years, beyond that the readings are misleading at best. Now ask yourself if 30 years is a large enough sampling to make a factual statement about global warming?
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Lloyd, there are other lines of evidence besides the instrumental record. However, the answer to your question is straighforward enough to be answered on Wikipedia — just wiki “Instrumental temperature record” and look at the references.
The more disturbing point about this isn’t the early temperature record (which is corroborated through other sources such as borehole analysis). What’s truly disturbing is that you act all high-and-mighty about scientific accuracy without even having the presence of mind to do a quick Internet search to answer your question. Not knowing something isn’t the same as that something being unknown.
If 2008 is indeed the 10th hottest year on record, we at The Anti Green Movement take full credit.
goantigreen.com
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Well since you don’t what to talk about the legitimacy of the data, let’s examine your wiki link. Here is my favorite quote, “The instrumental temperature record is viewed with considerable skepticism for the early years”.
The wiki link further backs my opinion by stating, that the accuracy of early year data is questionable.
Thank you for providing a source to back my previous statements.
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[…] A rationalist on climate change Interesting voice on climate change, at Greenfyre. For teachers, there are interesting sources that should work well in presentations. […]
I like this explanation of the difference between accuracy and precision.
The teacher asked the class “does anyone know when the dinosaurs died?”. Little Johnny raises his hand and says “I know, it was 65 million and ten years ago.” The teacher asks how he came up with that answer and Johnny says “Well, our book says it was 65 million years ago, and it’s a ten year old book.” A very precise answer, but not any more accurate than simply saying it was 65 million years ago.
I suppose if you wanted to question dinosaur evolution, then those 10 years would somehow be made to seem more important that the 65 million.
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I used the same wiki link that was previously posted by BrianD. The post where he used wiki for as a reference and to state I had failed to research. That link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instrumental_temperature_record) was also used to refute BrianD poor research.
Using the same link, you will also find this statement, “Early records also have a substantial uncertainty driven by systematic concerns over the accuracy of sea surface temperature measurements” .They are referring to the dataset SINCE 1850 not prior to 1850. (http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/temperature/HadCRUT3_accepted.pdf)
On a last note, I’ve never denied the variations in temperature only source (not manmade).
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The greatest prediction of AGW pertains to the Arctic and they are about spot on due to the summer sea ice melt and Albedo effects and being surrounded by land masses. The science is in and its good for AGW theory and bad for us in the long term.
AGW has been turned political and economic because we presently have no alternative technologies that can replace fossil fuels easily unless we commit to a lot of research and provide a good strategy globally. The lobbyists are not too happy either and want to continue obtaining supplements of millions tp provide coal, gas and oil to us all. The denialists in the main are sponsored by these copanies, it has been well documented especially in the USA where disinformation is a way of life for the right.
Science is not liked in the USA by the right, it pisses them off except for the arms race and putting satellites in space etc.
But the USA voted for Obama and hence the tide might tuen in time.
Pete Best: …we presently have no alternative technologies that can replace fossil fuels unless we comit to a lot of research…
We do have most of the required technology to start deployment now. The biggest impact we can have is simple energy efficiency plans, which can be as simple as insulating buildings and programming the place to turn off the lights after hours. The basic power generation systems are already available, but aren’t being deployed. Plug-in hybrid cars, which get >150 MPG and could easily make up over 70% of all consumer vehicles in the United States without making a single change to the US power generation/distribution infrastructure, are nearly ready and just need policy support for aggressive deployment.
Also, I should note that green tech is continuing to attract investors, despite the recession. It’s still growing. And a large component of Obama’s stimulus is likely to go to deploying green tech and efficiency measures, since these do in fact create exactly the jobs he promotes.
What’s needed now isn’t research (although that’s important). We don’t need a breakthrough. We need deployment.
I see New Scientist have linked to here now (3rd paragraph, “the climate deniers”).
You’re getting quite well known!
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We are. Without the help of you and Brian D and DavidONE and all the rest of the cyber-village that makes this possible, this would be nowhere. Thanks to all of you 🙂
Mike
Nice post.
[…] be coolest year of the decade*.” The deniers have begun pushing this meme, as Greenfyre notes here. [Even that meme assumes the decade began in 2001 — since 2000 was quite cool — a view mostly […]
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