WeatherRusty Posted January 18, 2012 Share Posted January 18, 2012 I am not looking for an argument, but what do you think is being referred to when "the science is settled" is offered as a statement of fact? My answer to the question is simply: The Earth is warming and human activities are the principle cause of that warming. I do not believe for a minute that the details of the science behind that statement are "settled" in any final sense. However, in a general sense the statement reflects the state of our scientific evaluation accurately. Those who study climate science most closely overwhelmingly agree with that statement. It is settled that the earth is warming and human activity is the principle cause. How fast, how much, climate feedback, consequences etc. are areas of continued research and are not settled as if we know what to expect with certainty, and no one claims as much. However, when skeptics play the "settled" card, they appear to want everyone to believe we refer to every aspect of the science as being considered settled when that is nowhere near the case. So skeptics, please respond with what you think climate science consideres settled when you make that charge. I think skeptics use the "science is settled" charge against the science establishment in order to make them appear unreasonable, short sighted, failing the scientific method and maybe to hold some form of agenda other than the persuit of knowledge. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vergent Posted January 18, 2012 Share Posted January 18, 2012 I am not looking for an argument, but what do you think is being referred to when "the science is settled" is offered as a statement of fact? My answer to the question is simply: The Earth is warming and human activities are the principle cause of that warming. I would add that the warming continues, and has been accelerating. Here the "skeptics" will want to argue about air temperatures. The warming I am talking about is the heat content of the oceans and the mass balance of the worlds ice. The amount of energy in these heat sinks is huge compared to a one degree air temperature change buried in the noise of chaotic weather. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WeatherRusty Posted January 19, 2012 Author Share Posted January 19, 2012 I would add that the warming continues, and has been accelerating. Here the "skeptics" will want to argue about air temperatures. The warming I am talking about is the heat content of the oceans and the mass balance of the worlds ice. The amount of energy in these heat sinks is huge compared to a one degree air temperature change buried in the noise of chaotic weather. More than 90% of all radiation absorbed and stored by Earth's near surface is accumulated in the oceans. The energy absorbed in the phase transition from ice to liquid water does not raise temperature in the process. The first place to look for continued warming is the oceans where the range of natural variability is much reduced relative to the atmosphere. The long term trend should be considerably less ambiguous and evident in sea level rise. Glacial ice and sea ice are on the decline most everywhere. 90% of all glaciers are receding, while Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets are both losing mass. Sea ice in the north is in rapid decline, while sea ice surrounding Antarctica has been growing. The most likely cause being the freshening of coastal surface waters as the continental ice melts. But why have no skeptics who turn the phrase "the science is settled" against the scientific consensus attempted to address my questions? What science is supposed to be "settled"? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobbutts Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 In popular use it seems to be a tool to avoid all debate on a topic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WeatherRusty Posted January 19, 2012 Author Share Posted January 19, 2012 In popular use it seems to be a tool to avoid all debate on a topic. Public debate or scientific research? When a climate scientist claims the science to be settled he/she is referring to the observation that the mean global surface temperature has been increasing and that human activities are the principle cause of the warming. Scientifc research continues on as always in the attempt to improve our understanding of all the implications, but it is no longer debatable that human activities are warming the globe. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LakeEffectKing Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 Public debate or scientific research? When a climate scientist claims the science to be settled he/she is referring to the observation that the mean global surface temperature has been increasing and that human activities are the principle cause of the warming. Scientifc research continues on as always in the attempt to improve our understanding of all the implications, but it is no longer debatable that human activities are warming the globe. I'd like to know the date that this became so......so I can go back in history (before that date) and read, view, or listen to some earlier debates. Thanks in advance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vergent Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 I'd like to know the date that this became so......so I can go back in history (before that date) and read, view, or listen to some earlier debates. Thanks in advance. December 11, 1997 http://www.wired.com/thisdayintech/2009/12/1211kyoto-climate-accord/ http://unfccc.int/re...nvkp/kpeng.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WeatherRusty Posted January 19, 2012 Author Share Posted January 19, 2012 I'd like to know the date that this became so......so I can go back in history (before that date) and read, view, or listen to some earlier debates. Thanks in advance. A single date? The realization has been built up over more than a century of research into the matter ever since CO2 was recognized as a greenhouse gas. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LakeEffectKing Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 December 11, 1997 http://www.wired.com...climate-accord/ http://unfccc.int/re...nvkp/kpeng.html Nope...couldn't have been....Gore claimed "settled science" in March of that year to lawmakers....so it's got to be further back... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LakeEffectKing Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 A single date? The realization has been built up over more than a century of research into the matter ever since CO2 was recognized as a greenhouse gas. So I might find some old debates on the subject sometime back in the 1920's maybe??? Do you know where I can find some old radio debate archives?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vergent Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 So I might find some old debates on the subject sometime back in the 1920's maybe??? Do you know where I can find some old radio debate archives?? http://www.aip.org/history/climate/co2.htm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LakeEffectKing Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 http://www.aip.org/h...climate/co2.htm Awesome!! Thanks! You are really good at using search engines....I just haven't mastered that skill yet. Kinda makes you wonder what those idiodic scientists were thinking back in the 70's about global cooling and ice age stuff.....must of been they were looking for THEIR 15 minutes of fame!! lol Hard to believe they were able to pull the wool (so to speak) over the eyes of quite a few journalists......wait........ummm... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hambone Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 When I hear the phrase "the science is settled" I take it to mean that the vast liberal conspiracy has closed debate on the issue. Man is evil, we must curtail mankind's capitalistic endeavors and learn to live on berries and spring water till we reach the next ice age. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LithiaWx Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 Awesome!! Thanks! You are really good at using search engines....I just haven't mastered that skill yet. Kinda makes you wonder what those idiodic scientists were thinking back in the 70's about global cooling and ice age stuff.....must of been they were looking for THEIR 15 minutes of fame!! lol Hard to believe they were able to pull the wool (so to speak) over the eyes of quite a few journalists......wait........ummm... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LakeEffectKing Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 and by the way? this cover: was about the energy shortage in the 1970s, not global cooling. it's used to lie about the issue and is not part of a good faith discussion. Though, quite telling that they didn't have a cover of sweltering old people in nursing homes with no AC....I'm just so surprised that so many peer reviewed papers were accepted on the topic of global cooling at that time.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TerryM Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 So is there a ratio of global warming / global cooling papers from 40 years ago that would sway one's position regarding the fact of global warming today? Perhaps the lesson that should be taken from this (assuming you're not just making things up), is that as science became more convinced of the probability that man was altering the climate, some got the sign wrong. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhillipS Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 Though, quite telling that they didn't have a cover of sweltering old people in nursing homes with no AC....I'm just so surprised that so many peer reviewed papers were accepted on the topic of global cooling at that time.... Pseudo-skeptics and denialist love the claim that back in the 70s science predicted global cooling - the claim has been debunked numerous times but, like a movie zombie, it keeps lurching onward - so, LEK, it's not surprising that you'd favor us with that moldy oldie. Here is the reality: A survey of peer reviewed scientific papers from 1965 to 1979 show that few papers predicted global cooling (7 in total). Significantly more papers (42 in total) predicted global warming (Peterson 2008). The large majority of climate research in the 1970s predicted the Earth would warm as a consequence of CO2. Rather than 1970s scientists predicting cooling, the opposite is the case. Figure 1: Number of papers classified as predicting global cooling (blue) or warming (red). In no year were there more cooling papers than warming papers (Peterson 2008). Scientific Consensus In the 1970s, the most comprehensive study on climate change (and the closest thing to a scientific consensus at the time) was the 1975 US National Academy of Sciences/National Research Council Report. Their basic conclusion was "…we do not have a good quantitative understanding of our climate machine and what determines its course. Without the fundamental understanding, it does not seem possible to predict climate . . . " And another excerpt: Reasoning Behind Cooling Predictions Quite often, the justification for the few global cooling predictions in the 1970s is overlooked. Probably the most famous such prediction was Rasool and Schneider (1971): "An increase by only a factor of 4 in global aerosol background concentration may be sufficient to reduce the surface temperature by as much as 3.5°K." Yes, their global cooling projection was based on a quadrupling of atmospheric aerosol concentration. This wasn't an entirely unrealistic scenario - after all, sulfur dioxide (SO2) emissions were accelerating quite rapidly up until the early 1970s (Figure 2). These emissions caused various environmental problems, and as a result, a number of countries, including the USA, enacted SO2 limits through Clean Air Acts. As a result, not only did atmospheric aerosol concentrations not quadruple, they declined starting in the late 1970s: Figure 2: Global sulfur dioxide emissions by source (PNNL) Source It would be a dream come true if we could skip the zombie arguments and stick to reality. But I bet some 'skeptic' will post this tired nonsense again on this or another climate science thread. Of course, it's not like the 'skeptics' have sound science on their side to offer instead. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WeatherRusty Posted January 19, 2012 Author Share Posted January 19, 2012 Though, quite telling that they didn't have a cover of sweltering old people in nursing homes with no AC....I'm just so surprised that so many peer reviewed papers were accepted on the topic of global cooling at that time.... LEK, Glad to see you having some fun with this! I think if you looked into the global cooling fear, it involved the buildup of aerosol pollution which is thought to have been in part responsible for the flat temp trend of the mid 20th century. Of course much of that industrial pollution was cleaned up. EDIT: Sorry I didn't notice Phil's much more comprehensive post as I was off feeding my 17 year old kitty by hand part way through writing. She has kidney disease. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LakeEffectKing Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 LEK, Glad to see you having some fun with this! I think if you looked into the global cooling fear, it involved the buildup of aerosol pollution which is thought to have been in part responsible for the flat temp trend of the mid 20th century. Of course much of that industrial pollution was cleaned up. EDIT: Sorry I didn't notice Phil's much more comprehensive post as I was off feeding my 17 year old kitty by hand part way through writing. She has kidney disease. LOL! I certainly was not intending on this going off tangent into a 70's global cooling debate....Just trying to find out when exactly there was ANY debate about Man made GHG's causing global warming.....wondering when stupidity waned and smartness waxed, up to a tipping point where the smart scientists ended the debate......Phil's beloved Peterson paper would have you believe that sometime in the 70's is really when any debate should have taken place.....but I still see no evidence of such. So we went from a "little bit" of concern for global cooling....then a lull for a half decade or so....then concern for global warming, which seemingly grew quite quickly (considering the complexity of what was being studied...the climate system... and the "recent", modestly talked about, global cooling) to a point of "settled science" or "time for debate is over" type language..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhillipS Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 LOL! I certainly was not intending on this going off tangent into a 70's global cooling debate....Just trying to find out when exactly there was ANY debate about Man made GHG's causing global warming.....wondering when stupidity waned and smartness waxed, up to a tipping point where the smart scientists ended the debate......Phil's beloved Peterson paper would have you believe that sometime in the 70's is really when any debate should have taken place.....but I still see no evidence of such. So we went from a "little bit" of concern for global cooling....then a lull for a half decade or so....then concern for global warming, which seemingly grew quite quickly (considering the complexity of what was being studied...the climate system... and the "recent", modestly talked about, global cooling) to a point of "settled science" or "time for debate is over" type language..... Well, remember that Dr Hansen briefed Congress on climate change in 1988. (I don't have the exact date on tap but I can look it up if you need it.) He spoke as NASA's expert on climatology. Even earlier, Isaac Asimov gave a radio interview on global warming and the greenhouse effect in 1977. Here is a link to the interview. It's only five minutes long and is worth a listen. Remember, too, that the IPCC was established in 1988 - so knowledge of climate change was pretty widespread and accepted by then. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LakeEffectKing Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 ?? Charles Keeling's work from the 1960s prompted NOAA to start monitoring CO2 levels in the 1970s. you are familiar with the Keeling curve, right? Nope....I'm as dumb as a brick. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LakeEffectKing Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 no one has said the time for debate is over. that is a strawman. there are findings and data that mainstream climate scientists have accepted as the starting point for the discussion, which were laid out in the first post. I am surprised at what you respond with, given you are a scientist. Your threshold for surprise is low then.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LakeEffectKing Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 Well, remember that Dr Hansen briefed Congress on climate change in 1988. (I don't have the exact date on tap but I can look it up if you need it.) He spoke as NASA's expert on climatology. Even earlier, Isaac Asimov gave a radio interview on global warming and the greenhouse effect in 1977. Here is a link to the interview. It's only five minutes long and is worth a listen. Remember, too, that the IPCC was established in 1988 - so knowledge of climate change was pretty widespread and accepted by then. Ahh yes.....back in '88, when I was a littl' budding believer myself in college. Then it all changed in a matter of a few months. It was EXACTLY that year when my attempts at debate/questioning of the hypothesis were cast aside with scorn.....and again, I was pretty much on board (and still am today, but to a much lesser degree) with the potential influences that our CO2 emissions might have. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LakeEffectKing Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 so you're just a troll? When I sense sarcasm?......Yes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bluewave Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 Pseudo-skeptics and denialist love the claim that back in the 70s science predicted global cooling - the claim has been debunked numerous times but, like a movie zombie, it keeps lurching onward - so, LEK, it's not surprising that you'd favor us with that moldy oldie. Here is the reality: A survey of peer reviewed scientific papers from 1965 to 1979 show that few papers predicted global cooling (7 in total). Significantly more papers (42 in total) predicted global warming (Peterson 2008). The large majority of climate research in the 1970s predicted the Earth would warm as a consequence of CO2. Rather than 1970s scientists predicting cooling, the opposite is the case. Figure 1: Number of papers classified as predicting global cooling (blue) or warming (red). In no year were there more cooling papers than warming papers (Peterson 2008). Scientific Consensus In the 1970s, the most comprehensive study on climate change (and the closest thing to a scientific consensus at the time) was the 1975 US National Academy of Sciences/National Research Council Report. Their basic conclusion was "…we do not have a good quantitative understanding of our climate machine and what determines its course. Without the fundamental understanding, it does not seem possible to predict climate . . . " And another excerpt: Reasoning Behind Cooling Predictions Quite often, the justification for the few global cooling predictions in the 1970s is overlooked. Probably the most famous such prediction was Rasool and Schneider (1971): "An increase by only a factor of 4 in global aerosol background concentration may be sufficient to reduce the surface temperature by as much as 3.5°K." Yes, their global cooling projection was based on a quadrupling of atmospheric aerosol concentration. This wasn't an entirely unrealistic scenario - after all, sulfur dioxide (SO2) emissions were accelerating quite rapidly up until the early 1970s (Figure 2). These emissions caused various environmental problems, and as a result, a number of countries, including the USA, enacted SO2 limits through Clean Air Acts. As a result, not only did atmospheric aerosol concentrations not quadruple, they declined starting in the late 1970s: Figure 2: Global sulfur dioxide emissions by source (PNNL) Source It would be a dream come true if we could skip the zombie arguments and stick to reality. But I bet some 'skeptic' will post this tired nonsense again on this or another climate science thread. Of course, it's not like the 'skeptics' have sound science on their side to offer instead. I think that most of the 70's cooling was a result of GSA's. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-11391238 The recent warming of the Arctic was also a result of ocean currents after the AMO shifted in the mid 90's. The big question is what percentage of all these changes is mans influence and what percentage is natural variability. http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20110023540_2011024624.pdf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Lizard Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 I got a Nigel Calder book called 'The Weather Machine' back in the 70s. Christmas or birthday, not sure which. Calder was on the coming ice age wagon. I don't comment much here in what I suspect may be a proxy for a lot of people for PR, because I really don't know the answers and can't contribute much to the science, but I do remember the Ice Age fears of the 70s. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Lizard Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 I may add I would expect some warming coming out of what is referred to as 'The Little Ice Age', and I don't think human carbon emissions would account for that, and in my carbonate geology class I got to witness the result of Milankovitch cycles in person, in repeating sequences, as sea levels rose and fell with ice sheet extent. (Mapping road cuts West of Austin in Cretaceous Edwards ) Whether man made CO2 is adding to that natural warming, I don't claim to know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhillipS Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 I think that most of the 70's cooling was a result of GSA's. http://www.bbc.co.uk...onment-11391238 The recent warming of the Arctic was also a result of ocean currents after the AMO shifted in the mid 90's. The big question is what percentage of all these changes is mans influence and what percentage is natural variability. http://ntrs.nasa.gov..._2011024624.pdf Um, what cooling in the 70s would that be? The 70s were warming, with a bit of natural variability for flavor. If you hvae evidence to the contrary please share it with us. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bluewave Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 Um, what cooling in the 70s would that be? The 70s were warming, with a bit of natural variability for flavor. If you hvae evidence to the contrary please share it with us. It's discussed in the link provided above. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhillipS Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 It's discussed in the link provided above. That magazine article you linked to talks about a spell of northern hemisphere, i.e. regional, cooling, not global cooling. I that what you were refering to? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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