Does anyone still believe in Global Warming? Have we all finally concluded that it was a hoax?

To expand a bit on my previous suggestion that the current century-scale upward trend might reflect a natural oscillation rather than anthropogenic forcing, I've made a couple more graphs.

The global temperature anomaly (and other related natural phenomena, e.g. atmospheric CO2) appears to have a fractal structure in time. Here is the total record showing annual and decadally smoothed data:

If we zoom into the box from 1990-2015 and show annual and monthly data, we get this plot:

The two plots have broadly similar character, or in other words a self-affinity consistent with fractal structure. Of course examining the data over two adjacent orders of magnitude tells us nothing, but if you've looked at the ice core data and the longer geological record inferences, you well know that similar fluctuations occur on much, and much, much, much, longer return periods. Hence it is (very!) reasonable to expect fluctuations on all time scales between the upper and lower bounds available in the different lines of evidence.

Which of course does not prove that the 1900s upward trend is in fact a natural fluctuation, but it clearly shows that such is a credible possibility.

The parallels with financial markets are indeed compelling... One can look for deterministic predictions of market behavior, but none such exist. The markets behave chaotically, and are beyond prediction.

My contention (and this seems to have at least a little support in IPCC V, which uses the word "chaotic" in its discussion of uncertainties) is that climate is a completely chaotic system, both beyond control (or controlling influence) and beyond deterministic modeling.

Suggesting that climate can be overwhelmingly controlled by one single factor (anthropogenically generated atmospheric carbon) is like suggesting that the world's financial markets can be controlled by one single factor. That's certainly (!) not true.

Can it be true for climate? Maybe. I think I doubt it though...

Fat hurts wrote:

Sally V wrote:

I am pretty sure I am smarter than most climate scientists. They have a horrible track record.

Yes, you obviously know more about climate science that the entire worldwide community that studies the topic every day.

But we're still waiting for your brilliant paper that proves them wrong.

I don't need to write a paper to prove them wrong. Their past predictions, be it 5, 10, 15, or 25 years ago, continually prove them wrong. In 1990 the IPCC report predicted temp warmings of 0.3 degrees Celsius per decade. That could not be more wrong. In fact, since 1998 there has been a slight decrease in Global Temps. Talk about a major miss! In fact, if you go by that report, the Global Temps should be 1.2 degrees higher as of 2030 compared to the 1990 temps. I would be willing to bet that we will instead have gradual cooling from 2014 (now) to 2030. I can pretty much guarantee that my guarantee will be better than theirs. Okay?

Sally Vixxxxxens wrote:

Fat hurts wrote:

Sally V wrote:

I am pretty sure I am smarter than most climate scientists. They have a horrible track record.

Yes, you obviously know more about climate science that the entire worldwide community that studies the topic every day.

But we're still waiting for your brilliant paper that proves them wrong.

I don't need to write a paper to prove them wrong. Their past predictions, be it 5, 10, 15, or 25 years ago, continually prove them wrong. In 1990 the IPCC report predicted temp warmings of 0.3 degrees Celsius per decade. That could not be more wrong. In fact, since 1998 there has been a slight decrease in Global Temps. Talk about a major miss! In fact, if you go by that report, the Global Temps should be 1.2 degrees higher as of 2030 compared to the 1990 temps. I would be willing to bet that we will instead have gradual cooling from 2014 (now) to 2030. I can pretty much guarantee that my guarantee will be better than theirs. Okay?[/quote]

Y'know, for someone who gets so butthurt about "on record," you certainly do pin a lot on the anomalously-warm year 1998. Do you really not see that "trends" that just happen to start with that outlier year are misleading, at best, if not actually consciously deceptive?

Did you miss the link, earlier in this thread, reminding us that there've already been two years that were warmer (globally) since 1998? Did you miss the datum about "[a]ll 13 years of the 21st century hav[ing] ranked among the 15 warmest" on record?

I'm actually at the point where I'm starting to think you're just a troll...a genuinely excellent troll, though (hey, credit where it's due). In which case: 8/10, and well played, sir/ma'am.

[quote]

Let me remind you that this information is presented in the context of evidence that is consistent with the physically plausible hypothesis. In that context correlation alone is meaningful. Moreover, 1, 2, and 3 are independent lines of evidence suggesting the same causation. Frankly, in the absence of very strong evidence to the contrary, I'd consider anyone who doesn't consider recent CO2 rises to be anthropogenic a crank.

While your statements are accurate as far as they go, the point in context is to bound "natural variation" of atmospheric CO2. Even if one integrates CO2 levels over the past couple centuries including the 20th century spike, it's bigger than anything in the paleo record. If carbon cycle models are reasonably accurate, we can infer that the level is going to persist for centuries as well. The CO2/temperature lead/lag question, while interesting, isn't relevant in the context of bounding the range of natural variation.

"Pray tell"? Are you trying to advertise your douche bagginess? Or was that just a minor douche bag slip up?

Presumably you are aware that you are debating another paid industry shill, posing as a "I'm so open minded and naive, please help me understand" child. More than likely the same one who periodically makes an appearance here and gets folks involved in long drawn-out nonsense.

Anyway, have fun. Just figured you might as well be aware of who you are 'debating' here.

Presumably Man wrote:Presumably you are aware that you are debating another paid industry shill, posing as a "I'm so open minded and naive, please help me understand" child. More than likely the same one who periodically makes an appearance here and gets folks involved in long drawn-out nonsense.

This is funny. Industry paid shill... If you read, I just admitted 3 or 4 posts back I'm not particularly open-minded. In the company where I work, a significant majority of my peers (all of whom who I hold in high regard) are strongly in support of the AGW hypothesis.

I didn't start this thread, but I do enjoy them when they come up from time to time. In every one of them I learn new stuff.

Recognizer of D-Baggery wrote:"Pray tell"? Are you trying to advertise your douche bagginess? Or was that just a minor douche bag slip up?

I guess I'm a d-bag...

Would still enjoy knowing more about my world view.

Two things:

Citizen Runner wrote:(1) Even if one integrates CO2 levels over the past couple centuries including the 20th century spike, it's bigger than anything in the paleo record.

(2) The CO2/temperature lead/lag question, while interesting, isn't relevant in the context of bounding the range of natural variation.

(1) If you average CO2 levels over the past century you will see the smoothed value falls within the expected range deduced from ice core data. We can't compare apples with apples. With the current direct observational data we have a bushel of apples. With the ice core proxy data we have a bushel of oranges. Or maybe more properly a row of jars of applesauce.

(2) The CO2 lag/lead question is of critical, central relevance as the CO2 --> temperature cause-effect link is the whole crux of the discussion, is it not?

Let me re-phrase this one in crank-speak:

hmmmmmm? wrote:(2) The CO2 lag/lead question is of critical, central relevance as the CO2 --> temperature cause-effect link is the whole crux of the discussion, is it not?

Does atmospheric CO2 cause global warming/ or does global warming cause atmospheric CO2?

That oughta rattle some fences. No doubt I look like an industry shill now, but that's an easy question to ask after reading the papers about the ice core data.

hmmmmmm? wrote:

(1) If you average CO2 levels over the past century you will see the smoothed value falls within the expected range deduced from ice core data. We can't compare apples with apples. With the current direct observational data we have a bushel of apples. With the ice core proxy data we have a bushel of oranges. Or maybe more properly a row of jars of applesauce.

Atmospheric CO2 averaged over the last hundred years is about 330 ppm. If you have proxy data that shows something that high, I'd like to see it. I'm looking at this:

(2) The CO2 lag/lead question is of critical, central relevance as the CO2 --> temperature cause-effect link is the whole crux of the discussion, is it not?

In the argument above, the satellite and surface spectral observation are direct evidence of a causal link between CO2 concentration and thermal energy retention. Why look at a more complicated scenario?

Citizen Runner wrote:Why look at a more complicated scenario?

Really?

Sally Vixxxxxens wrote:

Fat hurts wrote:

Yes, you obviously know more about climate science that the entire worldwide community that studies the topic every day.

But we're still waiting for your brilliant paper that proves them wrong.

I don't need to write a paper to prove them wrong. Their past predictions, be it 5, 10, 15, or 25 years ago, continually prove them wrong. In 1990 the IPCC report predicted temp warmings of 0.3 degrees Celsius per decade. That could not be more wrong. In fact, since 1998 there has been a slight decrease in Global Temps. Talk about a major miss! In fact, if you go by that report, the Global Temps should be 1.2 degrees higher as of 2030 compared to the 1990 temps. I would be willing to bet that we will instead have gradual cooling from 2014 (now) to 2030. I can pretty much guarantee that my guarantee will be better than theirs. Okay?

You have to put together a coherent argument to convince anyone of your position. Yes, you need a formal, peer-reviewed paper with convincing data. You have neither.

You don't even seem to know what science is.

Sorry this previous answer was a little snarky:

hmmmmmm? wrote:

Citizen Runner wrote:Why look at a more complicated scenario?

Really?

Academic / intellectual rigour.

The more important the question, the greater rigour it deserves. The ice core data show atmospheric CO2 leading global temperature changes. To my mind that is an extremely important thing that deserves an explanation in the context of the current discussion.

Fat hurts wrote:

Sally Vixxxxxens wrote:

[quote]Fat hurts wrote:

[quote]Sally V wrote:

I am pretty sure I am smarter than most climate scientists. They have a horrible track record.

Yes, you obviously know more about climate science that the

You don't even seem to know what science is.

Do you know about science? There is no "consensus" in science. Global Alarmists continually clammer about the "consensus" which is about the most idiotic thing a scientist could claim. Was there a "consensus" about the Theory of Relativity? Of course not. A scientist develops a hypothethis - then challenges it against repeated inquiries and then may develop a theory. To suggest that there is a "consensus" on Global Warming is the most idiotic thing ever. There is no "consenus" in science. None!

Citizen Runner wrote:I'm looking at this:

http://nas-sites.org/americasclimatechoices/files/2012/10/Figure-14.png

Yes, that's perfect. Imagine stretching that plot out by expanding it one order of magnitude, and showing the fluctuations at the next larger time scale. And imagine doing it several more times to reach the century scale. Do the mental experiment and see if you can imagine CO2 values in the past greater than the present.

As an illustrative example, here are the global temperature anomaly data shown for 1980-1990 with the data smoothed at three different time scales: decade, year and month:

It should be evident that the shorter term fluctuations are much greater than the longer term fluctuations, and in this case the range of fluctuations roughly double as the time scale changes by one order of magnitude.

Your CO2 plots are shown on a 100,000 year increment scale. To get down to the century scale we need to zoom in by three orders of magnitude. We can roughly estimate the fluctuations to be about 8 times (2^3) greater than shown on your plot, where we see a range of about 100 ppm. That would give us an expectation (with very high confidence) that the world has experienced CO2 levels much higher than 330 or 390 ppm in the past.

At least "high confidence" if we allow a strictly mathematical reasoning relying on chaos theory and fractal geometry.

Sally V wrote:

Do you know about science? There is no "consensus" in science. Global Alarmists continually clammer about the "consensus" which is about the most idiotic thing a scientist could claim. Was there a "consensus" about the Theory of Relativity? Of course not. A scientist develops a hypothethis - then challenges it against repeated inquiries and then may develop a theory. To suggest that there is a "consensus" on Global Warming is the most idiotic thing ever. There is no "consenus" in science. None!

Your obsession with "consensus" and Al Gore is hilarious.

I wrote this backward:

hmmmmmm? wrote:

The ice core data show atmospheric CO2 leading global temperature changes.

I meant to write the data shows temperature leading CO2. That should have been evident from context of my earlier comments. Apologies for the dyslexic typing