Question for the AGW experts

[EternalOptimist]

It's all becoming a bit Rumsfeldian around here

for example - physics based experiment.

you switch on a lamp and put your hand under it. it gets warm.
you move your hand away. it gets cool again.
you put it back. it gets warm.
you switch the lamp off. it gets cool again.

cause and effect.

Now you look at C02. Massively increase the CO2 and the planet warms up. Cause and effect.




what happens if you put your hand under the lamp, switch it on and your hand doesnt warm up ?

your world turns upside down - its spookily unreal


thats the problem PJ and the other watermelons have. They are seriously freaked out by this - their whole world view is going down the tubes

[Spacecadet]

for example - physics based experiment.

you switch on a lamp and put your hand under it. it gets warm.
you move your hand away. it gets cool again.
you put it back. it gets warm.
you switch the lamp off. it gets cool again.

cause and effect.

Now you look at C02. Massively increase the CO2 and the planet warms up. Cause and effect.




what happens if you put your hand under the lamp, switch it on and your hand doesnt warm up ?

your world turns upside down - its spookily unreal


thats the problem PJ and the other watermelons have. They are seriously freaked out by this - their whole world view is going down the tubes

What if just your fingers warm up? is that weather?

[pjclarke]

Firstly, proof exists in mathematics, not so much in science. What you get in science is the balance of evidence. The IPCC asserts it highly likely that most of the modern warming is anthropogenic. They assign a probablility of 90% to 'highly likely', leaving a one in ten chance that the warming is mainly natural.

It is uncontroversial that greenhouse gases have increased (by about 35%), we know from the isotopic signature of the CO2 and from simple carbon accounting that the increase is manmade. The warming power of this increase is also known to within about 10% , it adds a net radiative imbalance (or forcing) equivalent to about an extra 1.6 Watts falling on every square metre of the planet.

Usually, objects with a positive radiative imbalance get warmer.

Nobody seriously questions this much. Thus for the warming not to be manmade either we've got our sums wrong or there must exist somewhere in the climate system a natural positive forcing driving it. Nobody has found one of sufficient size yet, in fact our best estimates are that natural forcings are negative over the period, but the possibility that it may exist is not discounted, hence the expression of uncertainty.



Another pointer is the 'fingerprint' of the change. Different forcings would cause the atmosphere to react differently. For example, if it was driven by an increase in direct solar activity, all strata of the atmosphere would be predicted to warm, what we actually see is the surface and troposphere warming, but the stratosphere cooling, which pretty much rules out a direct solar explanation - but is exactly what we would expect from an enhanced greenhouse effect cutting down the escape of IR radiation from the surface.

More here: Empirically observed fingerprints of anthropogenic global warming

The joint national Science academies made a statement in 2005 to the effect that the balance of evidence was sufficiently stong for nations to take action to reduce emissions. Nothing has changed since.

[shaunbhoy]

Firstly, proof exists in mathematics, not so much in science. What you get in science is the balance of evidence. The IPCC asserts it highly likely that most of the modern warming is anthropogenic

The balance of evidence suggests that, provided the IPCC continue to advise world governments that the warming is anthropogenic, those same governments will continue to fund IPCC "research" out of the huge bucket of guilt taxes they are collecting from a gullible public.

HTH

[pjclarke]

Yah.... except that for any researcher or group who comes up with compelling evidence to the contrary awaits a Nobel at the least, Royal Society Fellowships, lifelong fame and recognition and the eternal gratitude of the most profitable corporations on the planet.

So far, ... nada.

[hugebrain]

Yah.... except that for any researcher or group who comes up with compelling evidence to the contrary awaits a Nobel at the least, Royal Society Fellowships, lifelong fame and recognition and the eternal gratitude of the most profitable corporations on the planet.

So far, ... nada.

What about everyone with a thermometer who has observed that the temperature hasn't gone up for the last decade. That's an awful lot of Nobel prizes.

Having said that I have my paper proving that the moon is made of cheese will win. After all, this is the committee that gave El Negro the peace prize!

[EternalOptimist]

What about everyone with a thermometer who has observed that the temperature hasn't gone up for the last decade. That's an awful lot of Nobel prizes.

Having said that I have my paper proving that the moon is made of cheese will win. After all, this is the committee that gave El Negro the peace prize!

good point, well made.

we have an awful lot of nobel prizewinners

they have a lot of awful nobel prizewinners

[EternalOptimist]

What about everyone with a thermometer who has observed that the temperature hasn't gone up for the last decade. That's an awful lot of Nobel prizes.

Having said that I have my paper proving that the moon is made of cheese will win. After all, this is the committee that gave El Negro the peace prize!

In fact, your jest is actually not so jesty.


The moon being made of cheese is actually a top notch theory, because it is falsifiable

Aliens on Alpha Centuri is a bum theory because it is unfalsifiable.

CAGW is a bum theory because we have no way of disproving it


These fellows may have good intentions, but they are anti-scientific

[d000hg]

First off, the world is not getting hotter at the moment. But if it were (like it was 12 years ago) the proof would have to include a physics based mechanism which could be tested and checked whilst at the same time ruling out the variables including the unknowns.
Sounds impossible ? yes, how on earth do you rule out things that are ill-understood

thats where the sceptics are coming from

I thought the sceptics claimed - just as strongly as the anthropomorphicians - that it wasn't man-made. By your logic, both sides are equally wrong to make such assertions!

[EternalOptimist]

I thought the sceptics claimed - just as strongly as the anthropomorphicians - that it wasn't man-made. By your logic, both sides are equally wrong to make such assertions!

you need to understand what the word means.

A sceptic is someone who doubts, someone who will not accept what the big daddy says without compelling evidence. Someone who is not easily swayed without evidence

The greenhouse effect is not in doubt, neither is a gnats fart in a hurricane