Resisting Climate Hysteria

[wayneL]

No you are not a broken record, I agree totally with your comments and this nonsense needs to be resisted.

From the 50's onwards religion began to be questioned in the west and science overtook it as a new faith, with verifiability and Popperism being it's golden tenets.

In the 80's and 90's science began a slow descent in to the religious dissonance, abandoning Popper's tenets.

Scientists now rely on modelling or predictions far out in to the future while ignoring events far in to the past. At least they have improved on the religious who hold to both.

It is driven by funding and self-interest , as religion was for centuries.

Spin has now taken over the Weather Global Warming ( Used to be Cooling) cabal.

The British Met Office released a variation to their warming predictions on Christmas Eve, probably to conceal it in the festivity news.

The University of East Anglia has been discredited over collusive emails some years ago.

There are a whole priestly hierarchy in our universities with rich political believers funding this new religion.

I have no doubt that industrialisation has had an effect on the environment, but their gloomy predictions fit in more with a heaven and hell scenario, than rigid science.

And they call those who question them " Deniers " as the religious used call people " Heretics " , and the former find it difficult to get even junior posts in universities, the new religious seminaries.

I shall buy a scuba tank to escape death or burning when I am thrown in the pond by these clerical "scientific" fanatics.

gg

Indeed!

The parallels you have outlined seem "undeniable".

 

[Knobby22]

Just some deniable facts. Damn scientists always puting their oar in. Should be left to common sense.

But you know, religion has often attacked science as Galileo would agree.

Heatwave exacerbated by climate change: Climate Commission

The report - Off the Charts: Extreme Australian Summer Heat - warns of more extreme bushfires and hotter, longer, bigger and more frequent heatwaves, due to climate change.

It says the number of record heat days across Australia has doubled since 1960 and more temperature records are likely to be broken as hot conditions continue this summer.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-01-12/climate-commission-predicts-more-heatwaves-bushfires/4461960


Ice sheet warming faster than thought: study

Map: Antarctica
A study of temperature records over more than half a century shows the west Antarctic ice sheet is warming nearly twice as quickly as previously thought.

A re-analysis of temperature records from 1958 to 2010 revealed an increase of 2.4 degrees Celsius over the period, three times the average global rise.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-12-24/antarctic-ice-sheet-warming-faster-than-thought-study/4442722

 

[wayneL]

Just some deniable facts. Damn scientists always puting their oar in. Should be left to common sense.


Heatwave exacerbated by climate change: Climate Commission

The report - Off the Charts: Extreme Australian Summer Heat - warns of more extreme bushfires and hotter, longer, bigger and more frequent heatwaves, due to climate change.

It says the number of record heat days across Australia has doubled since 1960 and more temperature records are likely to be broken as hot conditions continue this summer.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-01-12/climate-commission-predicts-more-heatwaves-bushfires/4461960


Ice sheet warming faster than thought: study

Map: Antarctica
A study of temperature records over more than half a century shows the west Antarctic ice sheet is warming nearly twice as quickly as previously thought.

A re-analysis of temperature records from 1958 to 2010 revealed an increase of 2.4 degrees Celsius over the period, three times the average global rise.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-12-24/antarctic-ice-sheet-warming-faster-than-thought-study/4442722

zzzz....zzzzz.....zzzzz....zzzzz....

Knobby, ferchrissake! Do you understand what the last few posts are about??

Sheeeezuzzzz!

 

[sptrawler]

Untill there is a global accord on climate change and how to address it, nothing will be resolved.
Putting a carbon tax on us and then telling the power generators it's ok to burn coal, we won't shut you down, is just a scam.

 

[Garpal Gumnut]

reply to Knobby.

I'll post it as two posts as it's a long document.

from the BBC a left wing media outlet.

Climate models yield confidence question

Grand statements about climate change impacts are all very well for scientists - a global average temperature rise of so many degrees Celsius, a global change in precipitation of such-and-such percent.

But no-one lives on the global average. We all have a home - and what might be very useful, be you a farmer or a city-dweller, would be some precise indications of what the future holds for your farm, your street, your village.

It's precisely what many people here at the UN climate talks are worrying about.

A couple of years ago, the UK government, using science from the Met Office and elsewhere, published a detailed study of likely climate impacts across the UK itself.

The idea was to tell authorities, businesses and communities what they could expect in decades to come in terms of rainfall changes and other parameters important when planning the future.

The project came in for a kicking from some climate modellers who said it was simply impossible to make localised projections with any kind of confidence, given the current state of modelling science.

Now, on the fringes of the UN talks, the Met Office - at the government's request - has published a new study plotting likely climate impacts on 24 countries around the world.

Twenty-one computer models of climate were quizzed for answers on issues such as vulnerability to floods, rainfall changes and suitability for growing crops.

And you can interpret at least some of the findings, again, as an exercise in the unfeasible.

As I said before we should not be commenting on present circumstances in Australia until the fire danger is past. It is not decent and not something a good chap should do.

I felt compelled to comment though as the Alarmists have hoed in.

gg

 

[Garpal Gumnut]

continuation

The UK is actually one of the best-studied countries in the world owing to a tradition of weather measurements that dates back centuries.

So the findings for the UK are among the most definite in the report.

As the Daily Telegraph put it, "good news for farmers" - virtually all of the UK's farmland is set to become more productive.

As the Guardian reported it - "millions more at flood risk".

When you look at the figures a little more, however, you see distinct differences in the confidence associated with each of those conclusions.

In calculating the proportion of UK farmland likely to become more fertile, the models' answers ranged from 60% to 99% - pretty firm stuff - and only one projected any losses in any parts of the country.

The flooding picture, however, is different, with estimates ranging from a 56% reduction in flood risk to a 180% increase.

Looking into other countries, even bigger discrepancies materialise.

The change in flood risk to Bangladesh - surely one of the most flood-prone countries in the world even without climate impacts - ranged from -59% to 557%

Dry Egypt could be better off by 100%, or worse off by 206%.

And an eagle-eyed colleague spotted that the proportion of Peruvians likely to be under more serious water shortages was calculated to be a round 0%.

The Met Office team explained that the impacts of melting glaciers were not included in their modelling - and that's set to be a serious issue not only in Peru but the much more populous nations around the Himalayas.

When quizzed about these figures, one of the Met Office scientists said that many other projections were based on single computer models.

Putting the range of uncertainty in the public domain from this large suite of models was, she said, "intellectually honest".

Fair enough. But the exercise also surely gives you an insight into the limits of current modelling when the various models, each of them supposed to be "state-of-the-art", reach such divergent conclusions.

As a policymaker, as a business leader, as a citizen, would you make decisions on the basis of these models?

gg

 

[sails]

Just some deniable facts. Damn scientists always puting their oar in. Should be left to common sense.

But you know, religion has often attacked science as Galileo would agree.

Heatwave exacerbated by climate change: Climate Commission

The report - Off the Charts: Extreme Australian Summer Heat - warns of more extreme bushfires and hotter, longer, bigger and more frequent heatwaves, due to climate change.

It says the number of record heat days across Australia has doubled since 1960 and more temperature records are likely to be broken as hot conditions continue this summer.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-01-12/climate-commission-predicts-more-heatwaves-bushfires/4461960...]

And hasn't China just had record cold, so what is your point?
I asked the same of IFocus but he has ignored it...

We have had heatwaves before - I have known worse. Again, what is your point?

 

[Calliope]

And hasn't China just had record cold, so what is your point?
I asked the same of IFocus but he has ignored it...

We have had heatwaves before - I have known worse. Again, what is your point?

I think Knobby is having a touch of climate hysteria. A few hot days will do that to impressionable people. A cold shower could help.

 

[Garpal Gumnut]

I think Knobby is having a touch of climate hysteria. A few hot days will do that to impressionable people. A cold shower could help.

You could probably get a gig on the "Professors" blog.

http://theconversation.edu.au/too-hot-to-sleep-heres-why-11492

One of his mind boggling original tips to stay cool at night is to have a cold shower.

Where would we be without Professors !!

gg

 

[burglar]

... Should be left to common sense. ...

There's not enough common sense to fill a thimble.

 

[burglar]

... to stay cool at night is to have a cold shower. ...

During heatwaves, the ambient temperature of water
in pipes is warm/hot, even overnight!

So! You get up, travel to Siberia ... have a cold shower.



Read it earlier, I have only just realised the absurdity!

 

[Some Dude]

To tell you the truth I find the whole issue very boring. Maybe we can blame basilio with his long winded proselytising for this.

I thing Smurf has got it right;

My apologies, I did not seek to impose.

 

[Some Dude]

In my opinion the reason it has been done to death, and will be done to death for quite a while yet, is because it is essentially a religious and political issue rather than a scientific one.

Do you mean the climate research done by climate scientists or the discussion about it in the general public?

Political subjects, particularly it seems those involving energy and resources, have a tendency of hanging around forever. It may not be front page news these days, but you'd be very wrong if you thought that issues such as exporting natural gas, uranium mining and building hydro-electric dams were "settled".

There are many who are concerned about the export of natural gas, noting that we are essentially selling off a key industrial feedstock and our future supply of automotive fuel at a bargain basement price. The re-industrialisation of parts of the US on the back of cheap gas adds weight to the argument.

Same goes for uranium. We export the stuff but there are many who are uncomfortable with this. Likewise practically any opinion poll shows that the community is deeply divided over the question of nuclear energy being used in Australia.

And then there's dams, the issue which lead to formation of what is now the Greens. Even today, mention of energy inevitably prompts a few "dam the Franklin" calls in Tasmanian newspapers - that issue certainly hasn't died as such and I suspect it never will. There's no firm proposal now, but if the CO2 issue turns out to be serious enough or is taken as such (ie increasing carbon price) then you don't need to be Einstein to foresee that we'll re-run the debate about SW Tasmania once again at some point in the future. Various opinion polls over the years also show that the community remains divided over the dams question (not referring to any specific dam or river) although support for hydro is stronger than for nuclear.

It's the same with things like ideas of bringing water from Northern Australia to the southern parts. The idea has been around over a century and it will always be around unless either it becomes obsolete (climate change makes it pointless or cheap desal gives us plenty of water) or something is actually built. Likewise the various railway proposals that never seem to go anywhere - they won't die in peoples' minds.

Working in one of those fields, I am very aware of about controversy in the general public but there is a difference between being politically controversial and scientifically controversial. My interest in people's perception is drawn more to the notion of how we determine that something is controversial, specifically scientifically controversial. Ultimately, everyone has no choice back to turn to the science but the controversies there are not what people think they are. If you would like, we can elaborate on this?

Climate change, no matter what your view, has largely become an article of faith. Supporters don't usually question it, and few change sides. The same could be said of big dams and nuclear energy - they have their supporters and their opponents but in both cases it tends to be more about faith than science.

If climate change were a purely scientific issue then it could be settled in a sense. But it is not really a scientific issue.

The underlying determination regarding whether it is happening or not is purely a scientific issue and the science was settled within the relevant scientific circles a long time ago whether others believe it or not. Like with evolution, gravity, quantum mechanics, and just about any other scientific principle currently in progress, the mechanics, consequences, implementations, and solutions are certainly being debated with much controversy as it should be.

There are many who consider that evolution and vaccinations as issues are not settled, should not be taught to children in school as fact, and are controversial. Certainly they are controversial in a political sense that some people do not want to accept our current overwhelming scientific understanding of those issues but I find it problematic to also imply that that means there is scientific controversy about the veracity of the underlying principle within the relevant scientific researchers.

The faith labels are interesting in that there is some truth to that but the implications are probably not what you want them to be. Do you have faith that the scientific process has established that general relativity is a better and improved explanation for gravity than the law of universal gravitation? Or did you do the math yourself?

 

[Some Dude]

And hasn't China just had record cold, so what is your point?
I asked the same of IFocus but he has ignored it...

We have had heatwaves before - I have known worse. Again, what is your point?

I could take this up if you like?

 

[Some Dude]

I agree with all but this.e.

From a scientific perspective, there is no way the issue can be remotely anything approaching settled in my opinion.

There is valid peer review studies coming to incongruous conclusions... and hell, there may even be political/religious reasons for that in biased study design. But overall this is a 'soft science' endeavour, subject to all sorts of bias and leaps of faith... and soft science predicated on soft science hypotheses taken as fact etc.

I am firmly of the view that it is a field that deserves study, but not the kind it is presently receiving. IMO this is not proper science at all, hence your observations.

..... I feel like a broken record.

Could you cite some of those valid peer studies you refer to?

 

[sydboy007]

And hasn't China just had record cold, so what is your point?
I asked the same of IFocus but he has ignored it...

We have had heatwaves before - I have known worse. Again, what is your point?

Considering global warming scientists have always said the natural variations of weather will continue as they always have, i see no issue with some places baking and some places freezing at above avg levels.

It is the extremes that will become more common place. They already seem to be.

How regularly do "extreme" weather conditions occur, before they are common place?

Anyone arguing the current weather is all about climate change is a looney, just as i feel anyone arguing against the petabytes of data out there now showing that there has been an upward trend in global temperatures. I really think the insurance industry needs to start drawing lines on a map and being very explicit as to the changes in risk they have seen over the last few decades. Along the lines of Suncorp no longer offering flood insurance in Roma till the state Govt finally built a levee. $500 million in flood damage all because a $10-12 million levee couldn't be funded.

With the way society has excised the environment from the economy, it seems until you can put a $ figure on something, it's not relevant.

I'd suggest anyone who see climate change as left win propaganda is to back your belief with some hard cold cash and buy some coastal property. If you're right you should make a lot of capital gains, if you're wrong, well you can see what coastal erosion and storm surges are all about.

 

[sails]

I could take this up if you like?

SD, thanks for asking, however, I really don't have time to be spending a lot of time as these things take time to go into the sort of detail you would want. No offence intended and accept that is your style, but I suspect you have more time than myself! There are historical charts and records out there and, if I get time, I will post again.

It seems that scientists are more interested in their computer modelled projections (which aren't always right - like Flannery's prediction of no more dam filling rains in Qld before the recent flood) rather than look at history and see that climate cycles have always been with us and to varying degrees.

So much fuss is being made on the media about this heatwave even here in Qld and yet on the Gold coast we only reached a max of 32 degrees yesterday and it was supposed to be a "heat wave". 32 degrees with high humidity is NOT exceptional in this part of the country.

...I'd suggest anyone who see climate change as left win propaganda is to back your belief with some hard cold cash and buy some coastal property. If you're right you should make a lot of capital gains, if you're wrong, well you can see what coastal erosion and storm surges are all about.

We live on waterfront...lol

And so does your AGW promoter, Flannery....

It would seem he has no fear of waters rising.

 

[wayneL]

Could you cite some of those valid peer studies you refer to?

There are a few interesting ones here. http://www.populartechnology.net/2009/10/peer-reviewed-papers-supporting.html#Highlights

 

[sails]

Resisting climate hysteria
by Richard S. Lindzen

July 26, 2009

A Case Against Precipitous Climate Action



Link- http://www.quadrant.org.au/blogs/doomed-planet/2009/07/resisting-climate-hysteria

SD, here is the very first post in this thread which you might find interesting. I did read it at the time, however, I haven't read it fully again now so I won't be up for dissecting it! It might give you a little background history on this thread....

 

[burglar]

... We live on waterfront...lol

And so does your AGW promoter, Flannery....

It would seem he has no fear of waters rising.

He has a tinny, ... and a mate!!