Yin Yang Tree

The Problems With DJ Drummond's 2008 Election Analysis

2008-11-08T22:07:00.000-08:00

DJ Drummond is a writer at WizBang. Before the 2008 election, he wrote several articles theorizing that the polls were wrong in showing Obama with a commanding lead for the election. Using his knowledge of statistics, he claimed several systematic flaws in the polls and a better way of analyzing the raw polls using historical weightings. One thing that was a bright spot for DJs articles was thye first paragraph of his Accountability article. There he made some very good points about being honest and being responsible for what he writes. Given his history, I was very interested to see if he would manage to live up to that after the election was completed and the results were known. Sadly, he did not (see Issue #1). So, I have taken it upon myself to document where he was wrong and why. I just have seven issues at the moment, but I expect to be adding more as time goes by and I have a chance to document them.

Issue #1:
DJ has cut off comments on that Wizbang after too many people called him on his multiple errors, logical flaws, and self-forgiving rhetoric. Eric and mantis already did a good job of bringing up points that I was going to make myself. DJ, being the accountable person that he is, decided to post a non-responsive reply, accusing mantis of lying without providing any evidence, claiming vindication, and having the last word. He did nothing to address the arguments mantis and Eric made, especially the one about using old polls for comparison (see Issue 2).

Issue #2:

First, the election results. At this time, President-elect Obama has won 52% of the popular vote, while Senator McCain has received 46% of the popular vote. Against that, let's look at what the polls were saying on October 21...

After the election, DJ, arguing that his analysis should be considered correct, takes polls from two weeks before the election. Of course, the actual polls taken just before the election had converged to a 7.6% advantage for Obama, withing 1% of the actual margin. Naturally, there was more uncertainty and variance 2 weeks before the election. DJ completely ignores this fact. If his analysis about how the polls had systematic flaws was correct, then those flaws should have still been there on election day.

Issue #3:
A portion of this article is devoted to the premise that "turnout this year was down, not up. Down by more than five million votes from 2004. Somebody did not bother to vote this year." I questioned this premise, since DJ was comparing the final tallies of 2004 (123,535,883) with the current, unfinished tallies from this election. At the time, the spread was 5 million votes, as DJ said. According to DJ's CNN link, the current total for McCain and Obama, as of 11/8, stands at 122,852,251 with 99 percent of precincts reporting, so there are still some more votes yet to count. However, this still leaves out two things. First, the CNN site just has Obama and McCain vote tallies. If you add the votes for other candidates, the total is over 1 million votes higher. The total for just Bush and Kerry was 121,069,054. The other thing is that there are still absentee ballots that haven't been counted yet. Even if a precinct has reported, these can still be added to the final total. Here is an independent and much more detailed analysis of what is left outstanding. While it does seem very unlikely that the total will reach the 130 million that was being reported the morning after the electon, 125 million certainly seems within reach. There are already more total votes than in 2008, so at least numerically, this article’s premise on that point is not correct.

Issue #4:

If you mean the 2006 article, Joe, that was opinion, not analysis. If you are claiming that I predicted a McCain victory from poll analysis, you are claiming something other than what I said.

I was speaking of the 2006 article and your reiteration of the claim here. I didn't mention poll analysis, so I'm not sure how DJ got that idea. As he says, this was a prediction based on opinion. However, he had very specific reasons that he believed this would happen. He believed that Republicans in general will put the country ahead of everything else, and the voters know this. Did McCain lose because Republicans don't put the country first or because the voters didn't realize it?
Of course he also believed that the Democrats would nominate a Senator, and the Republicans wouldn't. He further challenged another commenter:

Show me where I specifically predicted a McCain win, Crusty. Link and specific quote.

but cut off comments on that thread before he could be answered. Unless he want's to claim that McCain was not the Republican nominee, I believe that has been adequately answered.

Issue #5:
Let's get down to Historical Weighting, the basis for much of DJ's analysis over the past few weeks. Specifically, we'll turn to his Turners article. Most polls had several states solidly Obama and several solidly McCain, with fewer swing states. We'll use FiveThirtyEight for comparison. They had CA,CT,DC,DE,HI,IA,IL,MA,MD,ME,MI,NJ,NY,OR,RI,VT,WA,WI as "Safe Obama"; CO,MN,NH,NM,NV,PA,VA as "Likely Obama"; OH as "Lean Obama"; FL,IN,MO,NC as TossUp; GA,MT,ND as "Lean McCain"; AZ,LA,SC,SD as "Likely McCain"; and AK,AL,AR,ID,KS,KY, MS, NE,OK,TN,TX,UT,WV,WY as "Safe McCain". The election went almost perfectly this way. Their percentage for popular vote was also almost exactly correct. In DJ's article, historical weighting produced the following bizzare schisms with reality.
It showed CO a "lock" (75.0%) for McCain, as opposed to "Likely Obama".
It showed FL a "lock" (70.6%) for McCain, as opposed to "Tossup".
It showed IN a "lock" (80.9%) for McCain, as opposed to "Tossup".
It showed NH a "lock" (75.5%) for McCain, as opposed to "Likely Obama"
It showed OH a "lock" (71.7%) for McCain, as opposed to "Lean Obama"
It showed VA a "lock" (79.4%) for McCain, as opposed to "Likely Obama"
It showed ME a "toss-up" (51.6%) for Obama as opposed to "Safe Obama"
It showed MI a "toss-up"(53.3%) for McCain as opposed to "Safe Obama"
It showed PA a "toss-up"(51.5%) for Obama as opposed to "Likely Obama"
It showed WI a "toss-up"(52.3%) for Obama as opposed to "Safe Obama"
It showed OR a "toss-up" (50.2%) for Obama as opposed to "Safe Obama"
5 of DJ’s 6 toss-ups were double-digit wins for Obama. Only NC was an actual toss-up. Additionally, 6 or DJ’s 17 locks for McCain went to Obama. This analysis was quite far from reality, much farther than the national and state polls at that point.

Issue #6:

Chicago is getting really, really interesting. Yeah, it's strange that McCain should be close at all in Illinois, but there's some blue-collar backlash that turned Indiana around and has started moving some Illinois opinion. Like other states, I think the movement is temporary; Obama will no more lose Illinois than McCain will lose North Carolina, but I just report what the numbers show, and weird they are..."

Of course, the actual numbers showed no such thing. Illinois was never in question for Obama. North Carolina was very close, and did go to Obama.

Issue #7:
The closest thing to a prediction based on your historical norm statistical analysis that I could find was:

I will not call it definitive, but in my opinion if the demographic weighting is corrected the popular vote becomes Obama 46.9%, McCain 46.6%, but with McCain taking the electoral vote 278-260. When the shadow effect is applied, the electoral numbers change to 147-71 McCain, with 320 to be decided. The message is clear then, that the race remains to be decided.

If DJ was right, then McCain, who finished with 46% and 163 electoral votes barely got anything after that. Meanwhile Obama went from 47% to 53% and claimed around 300 Electoral Votes. That happened in one week. Is it easier to believe that almost all the undecided voters broke for Obama or that DJ’s analysis was very inaccurate? While he does not call this definitive, that’s just enough to give him bragging rights in the unlikely event he was right, but deniability if he was wrong.

A Brief History of Tuwaitha

2008-07-06T09:55:00.000-07:00

This post is in response to the original WizBang article: Where The Hell Did THAT Come From? posted by Jay Tea.

-------------------------------------------------------

From the linked AP article:

What's now left is the final and complicated push to clean up the remaining radioactive debris at the former Tuwaitha nuclear complex about 12 miles south of Baghdad.

Question from JT's article:
where did the yellowcake come from?

Answer from globalsecurity.org
"As of 2002, the only known store of nuclear material in Iraq is in heavyweight sealed barrels at the Tawaitha research facility south of Baghdad. It consists of several tons of low-grade uranium and is monitored by an international agency with the full co-operation of the Iraqi regime. Tuwaitha Nuclear Research Center, located 18 km SSE of Baghdad, was the main site for Iraqi nuclear program. Tuwaitha is the location of the Osiraq reactor bombed by Israel in 1981."

Another question from JT's article:

WHY is this story coming out now, over five years after we invaded Iraq?

The story of the Tuwaitha reactor and the yellowcake from it is very well documented both before, during, and after the invasion. From the linked AP article, "Tuwaitha and an adjacent research facility were well known for decades as the centerpiece of Saddam's nuclear efforts."
Before the war, the storage facility was sealed by the IAEA and inspectors visited the site as part of their pre-war inspections before the Bush administration asked them to leave.

During the war, it was big news that the Marines had "discovered" the site and explored it, finding high radiation readings.

After the invasion, it was discovered that the Tuwaitha facility had been looted, at least partially, though the US would not allow IAEA members to inspect the facility at the time to see what was missing. The barrels were often taken by locals who just dumped out the yellowcake and used the barrels.

As for this particular story, I would say that it's being reported now because the transport of the yellowcake was just completed on Saturday. It seems like a current event kind of story.

Update
As Ed Davis, a commenter at WizBang, pointed out, the GlobalSecurity.org quote refers to low-grade uranium, not yellowcake. This site has a much more comprehensive list of the material Iraq was know to possess before the Iraq War.

The Great Global Warming Swindle Review: Part II

2007-05-13T00:04:00.000-07:00

Unfortunately, it has been quite a while between part I and part II, but better late than never. This installment will deal with the assertion in the program that CO2 is an insignificant greenhouse gas. This argument (starting about 11 minutes in the show) takes a few forms, each of which we will examine:

1) CO2 is only a small part of the Earth’s atmosphere (13:31)
2) CO2 is not the most significant greenhouse gas, H20 is (14:10)
3) Humans contribute only a small part of the greenhouse gases (22:33)

Assertion #1 is undoubtedly true, but completely irrelevant. The vast majority of the Earth’s Atmosphere is N2 and O2, but these gases do not absorb infrared radiation, and are therefore not greenhouse gases. Since the program correctly states that the greenhouse effect is responsible for keeping the earth from being a frigid ball by trapping heat that would otherwise be reflected into space, it’s important to understand that without the greenhouse effect, the earth would be 25 degrees Celsius cooler than it currently is.

Assertion #2, that H20 is the most important greenhouse gas is also true. Although Tim Ball claims, "The atmosphere is made up of many gases. A small percentage of them, we call greenhouse gases, and of that very small percentage of greenhouse gases, 95% of it is water vapor, it's the most important greenhouse gas," the actual reality is that H20 is responsible for 36% to 70% percent of the greenhouse effect and CO2 is responsible for 9% to 26%. It is impossible to determine the exact percentages because of overlap, but Ball’s given number of 5% for everything but H2O is at least two times smaller than the most conservative measured estimate.

Just as a very, very rough generalization, skipping any feedback or feed-forward effects, let’s assume that the 9% contribution number is correct and that CO2 has grown by 23% since 1957. If we take the 25 degree Celsius number for the greenhouse effect, then we would expect a warming of 25*.09*.23 = .52 degrees Celsius of warming due to increases in atmospheric CO2. The amount of warming since 1957 is around .5 degrees Celsius. So, you can see that even if we take a conservative estimate of CO2's overall impact, it can have a noticable change on temperature with the current changes.

Before ending the H2O to CO2 comparison, there is another important distinction between the two. Changes in the levels of atmospheric CO2 are considered to be a force applied in the modelling of climate that will drive the temperature up. There are several other forces that act on the climate as well and change over time. H2O is not considered to be a force in the same way. Why? Because the mean level of H2O in the atmosphere is almost entirely a function of temperature. Introducing increased levels of H20 into the atmosphere will just cause them to quickly be rained out. Conversely, removing H2O from the atmosphere will be replaced in short order by evaporation. So, when people speak of H2O not being considered in the current climate models, it's not something that has been overlooked. It's just not something that drives climate due to independent changes in its concentration.

Finally, we get to assertion #3, humans contribute only a small part of the greenhouse gases. To quote John Christy, "Humans produce a small fraction, in the single digits, percentage wise, of the CO2 that is produced in the atmosphere." Human production of CO2 is about 24,000,000,000 metric tons per year as of 2002. This is about one tenth of the total production of CO2 in a given year by all natural sources. Of course, before the increased output of man, the natural production of CO2 and the natural sinks of CO2 were roughly aligned, so the overall level of CO2 in the atmosphere didn’t vary much from year to year. Increasing the output side by 10% has essentially overwhelmed the ability of the biosphere to absorb that excess CO2, so we get increased CO2 in the atmosphere year after year.

One other note on this subject as a closer. The program makes the bold (and completely false) claim at about 22:45 that, "Volcanoes produce more CO2 each year than all the factories and cars and planes and other sources of man-made carbon dioxide put together." The actual release of CO2 "from volcanoes, fumaroles, and hot springs and amounts to about (0.01 - 0.05) x 10^15 g C/year" compared to the burning of fossil fuels which releases about 5 x 10^15 g C/year, dwarfing the volcanoes output by a factor of at least 100. It is utter and complete falsehoods like this that make this show such a laughable endeavor.

The Great Global Warming Swindle Review: Part I

2007-04-10T22:14:00.000-07:00

As noted in a previous post comments, I recently watched "The Great Global Warming Swindle" thanks to a link from Reliapundit. It was a very interesting program, and I'll comment on it at length. I took quite a few notes, including direct quotes from the documentary, but I should warn that they may have slight errors where I missed a word or two.

There are several points and theories advanced in this video, and I intend to address most of them, with the notable exception of any issues related to the Kyoto protocols or the impacts of any such suggested solutions. This will be a topic that will undoubtedly take up several posts over the next few weeks.

In this first one, I will cover some generalized claims from the movie. Many of the specific claims will be dealt with in subsequent posts:

1."The Earth's Climate Is Always Changing"
Yes, it's true that the Earth's climate is always changing and has changed in the past many times with no human intervention. There are several things that can cause changes in the climate: changes in the sun's irradiance, changes in the earth's orbital alignment, changes in the level of particulate matter in the atmosphere, changes in the level of greenhouse gases, and, as this show features prominently, changes in the cloud cover of the planet. But, the number of direct climate drivers is actually relatively small, and at this point, pretty well measured and understood. Climate modeling often takes a hit, because it is essentially impossible to predict how these factors will change, and even what feedback effects will result from maintaining the status quo. However, it is very important to understand the difference between climate modeling to predict the future and climate modeling to explain the past, especially the recent past. When modeling past climate, the factors have all already been determined. The researcher has to measure all of the forcings that were applied to the climate and determine how they should be weighted to best explain the data. When climate scientists make predictions about the future, they are relying on modeling. When they make statements like, "the earth has warmed ~.6 degrees C in the past 30 years and anthropogenic greenhouse gas production is responsible for much of that increase," they are relying on measurements more than modeling.

So, the important fact isn't that the earth's climate changes, it's what's causing the change and with what level of certainty we can make that determination. People often die, but we do autopsies to determine what caused their death when we're not sure of the cause. If it was natural causes, then there is usually no need to delve any further. If it was some type of trauma that caused the death, then there is probably a need for investigation. A scientist saying "the earth's climate is always changing" is like a police officer saying "people die all the time" when pointed to a body lying in the street. It's true, but has little meaning when we can investigate and determine the root cause.

2. There is Nothing Unusual About the Current Temperature Change
That brings us to point 2. Is there something different about the current warming that separates it from past warming events? The directors of "Swindle" certainly conclude that there is not any difference. If we look at the past 2000 years of temperature reconstructions we can see that the current warming is easily the greatest temperature reached during that time. Although much is made of the Medieval Warm Period in the movie, the global temperatures at that time were only warm compared to the other temperatures before 1975. The global temperatures during the Medieval Warm Period did not approach the current global average. So, we're currently experiencing warming that, to the best of our knowledge, has not happened in the past 2000 years. Is that unusual? Going back farther, the reconstructions get more divergent and the granularity of measurement gets less, but, taking the average of reconstructions, we are currently warmer than we have been for 12,000 years (note: dark black line is the average of the reconstructions). Is there anything else that we are currently experiencing that is a climate driver that hasn't been this high in 12,000 years? As a matter of fact, there is. CO2. Can a similar claim be made for any of the other climate drivers we've identified? We'll see, in upcoming segments...

Watching the "Great Global Warming Swindle"

2007-04-07T11:33:00.000-07:00

I sat down this morning to watch "The Great Global Warming Swindle," with notepad in hand, ready to see just how good of a presentation anthropogenic global warming deniers would put together. Unreliapundit had helpfully provided a link for me to use to see the video, but, much to my surprise, I clicked on it and got, "This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Wag TV." Quick Google and YouTube searches also came up with a few deleted entries, and I didn't see any copies for sale on Amazon or Ebay. For now, I seem to be at an impasse in viewing and reviewing this work. If someone has a working link, please let me know.

Analyzing Beck's "Gas Analysis of Air by Chemical Methods"

2007-04-01T11:42:00.000-07:00

This paper was recently pointed out to me as absolute proof of a huge level of CO2 in the atmosphere around 1940, much greater than the current level. I hadn't seen this paper before, but apparently it has gained much credence with global warming skeptics that don't bother to look at actual scientific papers. So, I wanted to put up a quick review in case anyone else runs across this, giving some quick ways in which it and the underlying data are flawed.

First let me note that this paper does nothing except take previous measurements by other scientists, combine them, smooth them, and present them. There is no discussion or hypothesis on what could lead to such giant rises in CO2 or their subsequent precipitous falls. Naturally, since neither of those topics is discussed, there is no discussion of why, since the CO2 measurements have been continuously recorded since 1958, we don't see either of those phenomenons since that time.

Given that, let's take a look at some of the underlying data and see what we can note from it. First, the sites of these measurements not chosen to be accurate representations of the general atmospheric CO2 as the current sites are. Secondly, looking at the data, we can see that, in many cases, the large fluctuations in measurement weren't year to year or even month to month, but day to day, and even hour to hour. Let's take the Misra data set as an example. Look at the first line of measured CO2 percentage, taken at 06:00:00 on 12/14/1941. They show .052, .063, and .087 at the respective measurement heights. at 10:00:00 4 hours later the measurements were .031, .030, and .037. approximately 1/2 of the CO2 concentration measured just 4 hours earlier. Of course, that's just one data set. Let's look at some more. Duerst, Kreutz, Hock-Schollander, and to a lesser extent, Haldane all show tremendous fluctuations over very, very short periods of time. Ones that don't show these incredible fluctuations, such as Buch and Steinhauser all show measurements much more in line with the ice core record and well below the current CO2 level.

Please also note, the Misra data is especially important, since it is the only titrimetric data measurement between 1939 and 1950 that Beck uses.

One last note. Ever since the modern measurements have been taken, we have seen very regular annual cycles of CO2, peaking in April/May/June and bottoming out in Sept/Oct, causing 10-15 ppm difference. Looking at Kreutz, the volumetric measurement from 1939-1941, we see April/May/June hovering around 340-370 ppm whereas August/Sept shoots up to over 500 ppm.

So, in summary, let me say that wildly varying data (in ways we know that it shouldn’t vary) from 2 scientists in specific locations that are not controlled for any kind of CO2 contamination (Misra's location even seems to be chosen because of the agricultural CO2 contamination) with no even suggested theory as to how these spikes came about or why they dissipated isn't much. I guess that's why this paper was published here, instead of an accepted peer-reviewed journal.

On the other side, we have a method of measuring historic levels of CO2 at a location we know has no contamination issues and that current measurements match almost exactly with the continuous measurements of other locations chosen to avoid contamination. This doesn't seem like much of a contest, but somehow, there seems to be lots of grasping at this particular straw.

Update - 4/3/2007: I wanted to elaborate on two points:
1. The fact that the data is varying so much in the samples above could have one of two explanations. First, it's possible that there is a close source of CO2 or CO2 absorption. In any event, it is clear that what is being measured is not a stable condition of ambient CO2 in the atmosphere. The other explanation is, of course, that the measurements are insufficiently precise.
2. On the subject of precision, the volumetric method used by many of the papers referenced by Beck is discussed in the Erikson paper:

The average CO2 found in the Point Barrow samples is near to 0.040 per cent, and hence is seemingly 0.01 per cent higher than the standard value. This discrepancy is, however, within the analytical uncertainty of the method and may be unreal...Within the accuracy of the method (+ or - 0.015 per cent) the carbon dioxide and the oxygen concentrations were found to be constant through the seasons and within the standard values for temperate regions.

So, the volumetric method, trying to measure something that is approximately 0.030% of the volume of the sample has a error of 0.015%, or half of what it's trying to measure. Great...

What's in an Ellipsis

2006-10-11T22:51:00.000-07:00

Whenever I see a posted article with ellipsis, I always wonder what got cut out. Was it something that was irrelevant, or was it something that didn’t serve the point that the person doing the quoting was making? Today I have a perfect example of a dishonest use of ellipsis courtesy of, who else, Unreliapundit.

He’s written an article on how, “anthropogenic global-warming is bunk,” supposedly supported by this article. Here are some of his quotes:

“The Earth's orbit is not a perfect circle ... shifts in Earth's pattern of movement are relatively minor compared with those of other planets. But they can greatly influence the amount of radiation -- heat and light -- which Earth receives from the Sun. ... Astronomical impact "provides a crucial missing piece in the puzzle" of regular species turnover, it says.”

Note the first bolded ellipsis. What got left out? The cycle period of these changes. Here’s some of the unredacted passage:

The Earth's orbit is not a perfect circle: it is slightly elliptical, and the ellipticality itself goes through cycles of change that span roughly 100,000 and 400,000 years.
Its axis, likewise, is not perfectly perpendicular but has a slight wobble, rather like a poorly-balanced child's top, which goes through cycles of 21,000 years.
In addition, the axis, as schoolbooks tell us, is also tilted, and this tilt also varies in a cycle of 41,000 years.
These three shifts in Earth's pattern of movement are relatively minor compared with those of other planets.

So, he is trying to explain rapid warming over 100 years (at the most) with cycles that are tens of thousands of years long. Only he doesn’t want to let you in on that part. I guess it goes without saying that his last quote cut off just before this in the original article:

In addition to natural factors, the world's climate system and its biodiversity are also being affected by the burning of fossil fuels.
Oil, gas and coal, and to a lesser degree agriculture, release carbon gases into the atmosphere, creating a "greenhouse effect" that traps solar radiation and causes Earth's surface temperature to warm.

Tags: Global Warming

Too Hilarious

2006-10-03T00:00:00.000-07:00

My last post was responded to on Cheat Seeking Missiles. Here was the full text:

"You've got religion, Yangtree, and there will be no converting you. By the way, the organizations you cite for your documentation are just as biased as the ones Inhofe used."

Wow. That is too funny. His original post made the claim that, "The NAS report confirmed criticisms leveled against the hockey stick," and my post used quotes exclusively from that very NAS report to show that contention was incorrect and not factually based. His only response (and this was a comment by the original poster) was to then question my source, which was actually the basis for his article's original contentions. I guess you could say, in a way, that my sources are "just as biased" since they are the same source that he used. The only difference is that the NAS report actually said the things that I claimed. I'm not sure where a person who just tried (and failed) to use a source as evidence turns around and claims that the source is biased gets off, but I think it's the same place where the short bus stops.

Tags: Global Warming

Misusing the NAS Study

2006-10-01T14:41:00.000-07:00

This article at Cheat-Seeking Missiles gives quite a spin of the National Academy of Sciences report on temperature data and evaluation. They say that one of the main conclusions of the study is that "Based on the evidence cited and methodology used by the hockey stick researchers, the idea that the planet is experiencing unprecedented global warming "cannot be supported." Let's see what the actual NAS report says:

Global Temperature:
"It can be said with a high level of confidence that global mean surface temperature was higher during the last few decades of the 20th century than during any comparable period during the preceding four centuries...Less confidence can be placed in large-scale surface temperature reconstruction for the period from A.D. 900 to 1600.

Global Warming:
"Surface temperature reconstructions for periods prior to the industrial era are only one of multiple lines of evidence supporting the conclusion that climatic warming is occurring in response to human activities, and they are not the primary evidence." -- This quote explodes the blatant falsehood from the article that, "The 'hockey stick' is, of course, the fundamental DNA of the global warming argument."

"On the basis of satellite-based monitoring, which began in the late 1970s, it is clear that the rapid global warming of the last few decades is not attributable to an increase in the Sun's emission."

"Surface temperature reconstructions for the last 2,000 years are consistent with other evidence of global climate change and can be considered as additional supporting evidence. In particular, the numerous indications that recent warmth is unprecedented for at least the last 400 years and potentially the last several millennia, in combination with estimates of external climate forcing variations over the same period, supports the conclusion that human activities are responsible for much of the recent warming."

Mann "hockey stick":
"The basic conclusion of Mann et al. (1998, 1999) was that the late 20th century warmth in the Northern Hemisphere was unprecedented during the last 1000 years. The conclusion has subsequently been supported by an array of evidence that includes both additional large-scale surface temperature reconstructions and pronounced changes in a variety of local proxy indicators, such as melting on icecaps and the retreat of glaciers around the world."

Wow, what an indictment of global warming that NAS study is, eh. I guess one could say that I used "Precision-guided Logic Bombs to Destroy Biased Purveyors of Rep-rehensible Falsehoods".

Tags: Global Warming

Lee Corso Has a Baby Arm

2006-09-10T13:30:00.000-07:00

I'm not a big college football fan, but a fan’s sign displayed during the Texas/Ohio State halftime intrigued me. Long time sportscaster Lee Corso was doing his normal spiel on how the game had gone so far and what we could expect to see in the second half. All the time he was talking, a fan a few rows behind him held up a sign that said, "Lee Corso has a Baby Arm". No one watching the game had any idea what this meant. Were they saying Corso threw a football like a baby? That his arm was weak and flopped about with poor motor control? That the police needed to be alerted to a piece of a child's anatomy that he was storing in his refrigerator? Perhaps the bottom of the sign was cut off and it referred to a baby armadillo that Corso had as a pet.

After getting home and relating this story, one of my housemates did a little research and found this meaning for "baby arm"

Baby's Arm -- Noun. A penis of exceptional length and girth. Resembling the arm of a large infant child.

Now that I understood what the sign was intending to convey, the only question remaining was why. Apparently, Corso once blew up on the air during an interview when a joke was made that he posed naked for Cosmo (with disturbing photoshopped picture). The joke was made because he had roomed with Burt Reynolds in college, who did pose naked for that magazine. Apparently, Corso has been taunted by fans ever since over his sensitivity on this matter.

Tags: Sports, Football, NCAA Football, Lee Corso

Supposed Global Warming Across the Solar System

2006-09-10T00:03:00.000-07:00

There have been claims that global warming is happening solar-system-wide and thus must be caused by an external factor to earth. Let's examine those claims critically.

First, let's state what should be obvious. There is little that all the planets in the solar system have in common that influences their climates. The composition of the planets is very different, as is their size, distance from the sun, and atmosphere. The one thing that could definitely influence the global temperature on all the planets is the sun's output. However, the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, probably the most widely respected solar research facility in the world, has shown that the sun's radiation has remained fairly constant since 1940, while global temperatures on earth have spiked. As they have summarized this data:"Studies at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research reveal: solar activity affects the climate but plays only a minor role in the current global warming."

Now let's look at each one of the planets and moons that "global warming" is said to be happening on:

Jupiter -- It's not experiencing global warming at all, but it is experiencing global climate change. "This will create a big wall and stop the mixing of heat and airflow, the thinking goes. As a result, areas around the equator become warmer, while the poles can start to cool down." This is a result of "movement of heat from the equator to Jupiter's south pole". In order for one to claim "global warming" it should actually be warming that is occurring globally.

Triton -- "There are two possible explanations for the moon's warmer weather. One is that the frost pattern on Triton's surface may have changed over the years, absorbing more and more of the sun's warmth. The other is that changes in reflectivity of Triton's ice may have caused it to absorb more heat." Neither reason is relevant to Earth's situation or warming.

Enceladus -- I don't even know why this one was listed. It's not experiencing a change, the Cassini probe determined that there were unexpected "warm fractures" on the surface, leading scientists to conclude that there is a "strong indication that internal heat is leaking out of Enceladus and warming the surface along these fractures." This one is the ultimate red herring. It's not a climate change, but a new discovery. It's localized on the surface to certain areas, not a global phenomenon. What is happening has no relevance to earth.

Saturn The original article above states that, "Saturn itself has a rather warm southern pole, and the temperatures in that region suddenly jumped by 3-5 Kelvin degrees." This is a misinterpretation of the linked article. The abrupt temperature change is not over time, it's over distance, "Temperatures increase toward the pole abruptly near 70 degrees latitude from 88 to 89 Kelvin (-301° to -299°F) and then to 91 Kelvin (-296° F) right at the pole. Near 70 degrees latitude, the stratospheric temperature increases even more abruptly from 146 to 150 Kelvin (-197° to -189°F) and then again to 151 Kelvin (-188°F) right at the pole." Of course, again, even this is a regional phenomenon.

Pluto -- "The change is likely a seasonal event, much as seasons on Earth change as the hemispheres alter their inclination to the Sun during the planet's annual orbit."

Mars -- The changes observed to Mars ice caps are fairly recent, localized, seasonal change on Mars. It's not a planet-wide trend there. The South Polar Icecap is the only area affected.

Venus -- The inclusion of this one is extra bizarre. Once again, no change is stated or even implied, so what is the point? Yes, Venus has a hot climate due to the greenhouse effect. This would seem to be more of a cautionary tale as to what our planet is moving towards if we release gases and create an atmosphere that traps increased amounts of solar radiation.

Tags: Global Warming

Even More Unreliapiundit Stomping Fun

2006-09-04T00:32:00.000-07:00

As per usual, Unreliapundit's crying is much more pronounced than his arguments. His latest protest is that his blog is becoming clogged with my long comments. The series of tubes that Ted Stevens has told him that his blog is powered by apparently does not have the capacity to transmit my verbiage. In defernce to his creaky infrastructure, here are my latest responses to his bizarre assertions, linked to from his comments.

"The researchers identified three large areas of the Pacific where phytoplankton appeared to be suffering from a lack of iron - the southern ocean around Antarctica, the sub-arctic north below Alaska, and a vast area in the tropical Pacific cent[e]red on the equator."

Unreliapundit -- if these three areas were healthy - as the rest of the world's plankton apparently is, then these three large areas would be sequestering more co2.then, it follows necessarily, that there would be less atmospheric co2.

Yes, if these plankton had more iron, and this didn't cause them to be consumed more by fish (as was a potential feedback loop noted in the article), then they could potentially be holding more CO2. But this isn't a "cause" of rising levels of CO2 in the atmosphere, as you ridiculously continue to believe below, any more than the fact that more CO2 could be dissolved in the ocean than is currently there is a "cause".

"if atmospheric co2 contributes to global warming - something which is unproven (especially in view of known historical and pre-historical eras of warming an cooling)"
So, you're denying that the greenhouse effect exists? Very smart.

"then these three unhealthy areas of plankton might be a major cause."
There you go again with the "cause." If the plankton iron levels haven't changed over time (and you have already admitted that we have no reason to believe that they have), then how can their lack of change "cause" anything? The most that you can say is that the plankton could potentially be holding more CO2 than it is. It's like looking at a field that's been empty for 100 years and calling it a "cause" of CO2 in the atmosphere because it could have trees on it instead of being barren.

"since there are many known eras of global warming which predate industrialism and man-made co2 it is reasonable to assume that similar non-anthropgenic forces might be causing warming today."
Let's say that all eras of global warming and cooling had a cause or causes. Some of them may have been the same. Some of them may have been different. Let's further assume that the causes are knowable and measurable. This is not to say that we necessarily know the causes or have measured them, just that they're not caused by extra-dimensional fairies, or the storm god Thor, or something like that.

Part of what scientists do is try to make these measurements and determine the reasons behind these changes. Based on what they learn, they make predictions of future behavior and create models of the environmental system. In this case, here's what they observed, measured, and concluded:

1) Man is releasing ever growing amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere.

2) The measured level of atmospheric CO2 is increasing at approximately the same rate.

3) The greenhouse effect, which was a well understood and well-documented scientific principle long before the current debate, states that CO2 in the atmosphere is partially responsible for the absorption of radiation from the planet back into space. The more energy that is absorbed, the greater the warming. The more CO2, the greater the absorption.

4) Over the past few decades, especially as the CO2 increase has grown to a significant portion of the CO2 level in the atmosphere, the global temperature has risen.

5) Models and theories are often judged on their predictability. How well do they predict what will happen. The theory of gravity predicts that if I hold a pencil 5 feet off the earth and let it go, it will fall towards the earth. Similarly, the theory of global warming has predicted global climate change quite accurately since the theory has been refined and accepted.

You say that, "it is reasonable to assume that similar non-anthropogenic forces might be causing warming today," but there is nothing that has been observed or measured that has been changing in such a fashion to explain the warming. So, why is it more reasonable to think this is caused by other unobserved factors than by the observed and measurable factors? In 1995, the IPCC said, "The balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence on global climate." In 2001, they revisited the question, based on 6 more years of evidence and said, "There is new and stronger evidence that most of the warming observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities". However, you still want to make an ass out of you[rself], and assume what you fervently want to believe, clearly being more qualified than thousands of scientists that have studied this for years.

"also hajckass joe: please nopte the use of the word SERIOUSLY in my post. which most SANE people undertand measn to take the previous staement with a graion of salt.
I took this to apply to the immediately preceeding line, "What will Gore do about this, give iron supplements to ocean algae!?", not your entire article. If you did mean your whole article as a joke (even more of a joke than every other article you've ever written, I mean), then I wonder why you have tried to defend it repeatedly, only now remembering that the whole thing was just a joke.

"you didn't GET IT and commented AD NAUSEUM to my joke as if it was a serious comment with crap i won't bother to sift through because it'd be a waste of my time."
Ah yes, the "I can't waste my time" defense. In one post you lay down a challenge to prove global warming is man-made. In the next, you can't be bothered to read my long, difficult-for-you-to-comprehend arguments because you might miss out on writing another joke article.

Tags: Global Warming

Latest Global Warming Debate Entry from Unreliapundit

2006-09-02T01:22:00.000-07:00

Unreliapundit believes he's ready for another go-round on global warming. While he's pretty much retreading territory he's alredy lost in the past, I'll put his latest effort up again as an illustration of just how weak and pathetic his arguments are on the topic of global warming.

"planktopn and thew amazon sequester less co2 than they should according to models. the amazon has trees which are older than scienbtists figured; plankton in some regions of the seas absord less co3. this proves that the models the scientists use are a all wrong. hence their projections are all wrong."

Wow. All of science is wrong because estimates of some factors (that they knew were only estimates) have now been enhanced with better data. Using your logic, you'd similarly have to agree that, since estimates of the cost and duration of the war in Iraq were wrong, that the war is all wrong, not to mention current calculations and projections of GDP.

Certainly, the models have some degree of inaccuracy. Anyone on either side of the debate will acknowledge that. Science is all about making observations and drawing conclusions based on the data. As data gets better, conclusions get better. As you pointed out today scientists cut their best and worst case scenarios. Better modeling and better data give a narrower range of future possibilities.

"this year we are seeing fewer storms than last. if co2 is rising and if co2 increases increase the energy in the atmpsphere then this would be impossible."
Uh, no. You really don't understand how factors and weighting work do you? For example, let's say we have a pair of loaded dice that will roll double 6's 1/12 of the time instead of the normal 1/36. If you and I played craps with these dice and I knew they were loaded and you did not, I could continuously win a lot of money from you, since you obviously believe that they couldn't be rigged if they didn't come up 12 every time. Climate change is the same way. CO2 in the atmosphere is not the only factor driving global climate. There are still solar cycles. There are still other variations that drive effects. However, increased CO2 is one that is serving on average to drive the temperature higher changing the weighting. Thus, in normal variability, the peaks will be higher and the valleys not as deep, but it doesn't suddenly make them not exist. Also, as I've already noted the climate change is just another factor in hurricane season. While it is a factor, it is one of many, probably a relatively minor driving factor given the temperature increase we've seen to date.

"this is more proof that co2 is a boogeyman and that man-made increases are not a major input."
If you mean input to overall hurricane count, I agree, at least at this point. If you mean global temperature, I disagree, Once again, we are on course to have the warmest year (globally average speaking) on record. If your premise above was correct (more energy must ALWAYS equal more storms), that would mean that we would have to have more storms. Your premise is simply wrong. While there are a few climate scientists that currently claim that noted global warming is not mostly caused by man's release of CO2 into the atmosphere, I can't think of any that claim that global warming isn't actually happening since about 2001/2002.

"there are no scientific records which might prove whether plankton absorbed more or less twenty years ago, or had better iron uptake."
If we can't know, as you now seem to realize, then how do you explain your assertion, "so apparently plankton is the real culprit responsible for higher atmoshperic CO2 and not SUV's". You just admitted that you have no data to base this assertion on, so how can it be "apparent". You might as well have said that it is caused by fairy dust, since we have no data to prove or deny that either. There's no reason to believe that the iron content is different in these areas than it has been for quite awhile. Indeed, the paper you linked to says that they used 12 years of data to determine the lack of iron in "three large areas of the Pacific", so we know that it has been relatively stable over that period, while CO2 has been steadily increasing. I guess that totally destroys your theory, at least for the last 12 years.

"this also proves that the models are bogus. the models cannot account for the natural variables in co2 uptare."
They don't actually need to. As I noted in my last post (and you ignored), "We know how much CO2 man’s activities release into the atmosphere every year. We measure the level of CO2 in the atmosphere every year. The two correlate quite well." Unexplained variability exists, but is fairly small compared to what we can measure directly. You believe simultaneously that the CO2 we know that man is creating and releasing into the atmosphere magically vanishes AND that there is some as yet unmeasured, unobserved phenomenon that is causing global CO2 levels to rise. Very scientific.

"it may very well be true that if trees in the amazxn are older than at any time in the past (due to a lack of cutting, disease, fires, etc) and if the plankton has less iron than ever before that these are the causes of any increase in atmospheric co2 and not man."
Once again, there is no evidence of this. You thought you read an article that said this, and I showed that it didn't actually say that. Now, you claim that it still might be true, even though no one who is actually involved claims this. The reason that scientists were wrong about the age of the trees was that the trees mature more slowly than they thought. There's really no mystery about why the estimates were made as they were and why they were wrong, as much as you'd like to invent one.

And seriously, "lack of cutting." Are you insane? "Between May 2000 and August 2005, Brazil lost more than 132,000 square kilometers of forest -- an area larger than Greece -- and since 1970, over 600,000 square kilometers (232,000 square miles) of Amazon rainforest have been destroyed."

"more proof: manmade co2 has steadily increased every year for the last 100 years but temps have not."
I addressed this above. No one ever claimed that CO2 and the greenhouse effect are the only factor in global temperature. I've repeated this many times, but you still seem to believe that there is some point here. In what would otherwise be a temperature valley, increased CO2 will mitigate at least some of that effect. It doesn't erase variability. Who ever claimed that it did? Arguing against points that no one ever made is commonly known as engaging straw men. You do this a lot. My salient points are often ignored as you charge and repeatedly beat the straw. I, on the other hand, try to highlight each of your "points" and address each in turn. Please point out if you feel that I have missed any.

"you, joe, are a dupe and a fool."
I appreciate your invective as a lack of substantial argument. Here's who I have on my side in this debate:

The US National Academy of Sciences
The Pentagon
The American Meteorological Society
The Union of Concerned Scientists
The American Association for the Advancement of Science
The American Geophysical Union

and those are just the US organizations. I'll add the international organizations if you desire in my next post.

"thanks for demonstrating that here once again."
If you liked my demonstrations so much, then why did you delete them? I would think you'd post them on your front page, like I post my repeated smackdowns of you on my blog. I think you actually see the reality of who comes out on top in every one of our discussions. That's why you have tried to beg, coerce, and threaten me into not responding in the past.

"i find it fascinasting that, the left fears the bogeyman of manmade c02 (and want to enact draconian laws/taxes to stop try to dtop it) and claim that the bushies planned 9/11 (and that you want bush impeached and forces withdrawn from iraq) but that the left wants to appease the jihadoterrorist - a real breathing threat which openly avows to wipe us out and destroy our civilazation, and whch is takeing real measures to do just that."
For the record, I have never claimed that Bush or any American was involved in 9/11 or that terrorism is not a threat. I also do not recommend draconian laws/taxes to try and forestall global warming. You're sure punching the hell out of that straw. If only your actual arguments against points that I argued were as strong as those against points I never did.

"the reazl threat the left denies. it's only the fake threats the left focuses on."
Can you comprehend that there might actually be more than one threat that needs to be addressed at any time in history? I guess not. One threat at a time, please, that's all your brain can handle. Everything else must be fake.

fascinating. denial denial denial denial.
I couldn't have said it better myself. You deny obvious explanations in favor of undetected fantasies. You deny the repeated and consensus conclusions of scientists in favor of your own fevered faith-based conclusions. You deny even deny what you previously claimed. I'm glad you find it so fascinating.

"joe: prove to me that climate change is not natural. and that the climate change we see now is not caused by what caused it the many MANY times the earth has had climate change before."

What proof could I present that you would accept? As I remember, when I previously, repeatedly pointed out that you had miscalculated a percentage on one of your posts, you refused to acknowledge your error. The posted error still persists to this day, never corrected, even though your header boldly proclaims that you "correct disinformation". That was a math error, one that there was no question about, but still, you didn't accept it, faced with absolute and incontrovertible proof.

There is no amount of evidence that can ever prove something to someone who is as willfully and proudly ignorant as you are. I have disproven so many of your claims in the past that you clearly are unreachable. I respond so that people who read can see how wrong you are and judge for themselves which one of us makes more sense. Oh, and for fun. It is always fun to see you cry and run away, deleting the posts and locking the threads that have aggravated and beaten you so thoroughly :-)

Tags: Global Warming

Once Again, A Doozy From Unreliapundit

2006-08-31T22:51:00.000-07:00

From Unreliapundit regarding this article:

The amount of carbon absorbed by plant plankton in large segments of the Pacific Ocean is much less than previously estimated, researchers say. US scientists said the tiny ocean plants were absorbing up to two billion tonnes less CO2 because their growth was being limited by a lack of iron.

Iron deposits provide nutrients for the microbes, which in turn grow by absorbing [sequestering] atmospheric carbon dioxide. The findings have been published in the science journal Nature.

Unreliapundit's conclusion:
If they are sequestering less, then more will stay in the atmosphere. Er, um ... so apparently plankton is the real culprit responsible for higher atmoshperic CO2 and not SUV's. Hmmm. What will Gore do about this, give iron supplements to ocean algae!?

His misinterpretation of this article closely mirrors his misunderstanding of the article on the Amazon rainforest carbon sequestration (point 6). This article isn’t saying that a sudden lack of iron is causing plankton to absorb less CO2. It’s saying that the models that were previously being used didn't take into account the lack of iron in some regions and were thus over-estimating the amount of CO2 that the plankton was using worldwide. Thus, there’s no "increase in CO2" due to this finding about the plankton. So, this statement, "If they are sequestering less, then more will stay in the atmosphere," makes no sense. They’re not sequestering less than they were before. They’re sequestering less than was estimated.

We know how much CO2 man’s activities release into the atmosphere every year. We measure the level of CO2 in the atmosphere every year. The two correlate quite well (along with the measured effects of deforestation). Nothing in the past 400 thousand years even comes close to what we have seen in the past 100. As usual, Unreliapundit misinterprets fairly simple and straightforward articles to try and reassure himself that the facts are other than what they are?

"What will Gore do about this, give iron supplements to ocean algae?" Actually, this may not be such a bad idea. Then, the plankton would actually take up more CO2, as the original estimates said. However, as the article also notes, there is a feedback loop that cause the organisms that eat the plankton to "come to life because they suddenly have a more abundant food supply". So, this might not be as effective as it would seem on the surface.

Maybe I should start calling him Unreliapundidiot.

Tags: Global Warming

The End of Another Debate

2006-08-06T23:25:00.000-07:00

This is a reprint of my response to Mark A. Rose at Right Minded. Unfortunately, Mark's other concerns will prevent him from continuing to debate this issue with me. I'll finish critiquing his alredy posted articles, but he has indicated that he will not have the time to respond further. I'm disappointed, but I appreciate his comments and responses thus far. Mark conducted himself as a gentleman, and I always appreciate a good debate. I guess I'll have to keep searching for someone in the blogosphere that is truly willing to debate the scientific issues of global warming from the right.

Mark,

I'll go ahead and answer you last comment here, and then comment on your recently reprinted article at my blog and give the reference here when that's up.

As you have noted, climate is complex with feedback that can happen, leading to many potentially complicated scenarios. I assume that you understand the Gulf Stream and its importance to the temperature of Northern Europe. If the Gulf Stream stopped functioning because of an influx of colder water into the system, caused by melting glaciers due to global warming, then the result for that particular area would be for the temperature to decrease. The Gulf Stream contributes significantly more of a warming effect to Northern Europe than global warming does, at least for the short term.

This is not trying to have it both ways. It is a scientific prediction based on understanding the Gulf Stream, how it works, and its localized effect on climate. Note that is localized, not global. Global warming, naturally, has predicted and continues to predict increasing temperatures when measureed globally.

A true example of trying to have things both ways would be to declare both, "we only have at best 100 years worth of weather records to go on" and "historical and geological records tell us that the earth's climate has undergone wild fluctuations throughout the eons." When you want to make a point about climate fluctuations, ancient historical data is so solid that you "know...that the earth's climate has undergone some wild fluctuations." When a point is made about the most recent 2000 years, data confirmed through many different measurements, suddenly, we cannot make any definitive statements.

You ask why we should believe forecasts made by global warming scientists. I offer two simple reasons. First, as I pointed out, global warming skeptics and scientists both made predictions of the future for 2005-2006 back in 1999-2002. Skeptics said that the warming trend would stop since the El Nino effect of 1998 and the sun's cycle (which was at its maximum at that time) were causing almost all of the noted warming. Global warming scientists said that, while those effects were not negligible, that the warming trend was mainly being driven by increased greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and that was going to cause the warming trend to continue. We're now at 2006. With the measurements of global temperature more accurate than ever before, the predictions of the scientists were correct and the predictions of the skeptics were plainly wrong. So, the first reason is that we've had both sides make their predictions and one side's was clearly right and the other's was clearly wrong.

Of course, the global warming scientists could just have been lucky. This brings us to point #2. The science behind global warming and the greenhouse effect is well understood. If this was any other scientific theory, there would be no further debate. It's only because this theory has policy implications that people, like you, are uncomfortable with, that this science ever gets questioned at all. The theory is solid, the observations and measurements completely back it up, and the scientific community, with a very few exceptions, completely backs the conclusions. Of course, there is a lot of debate on EXACTLY what will happen, how fast the temperature will increase, how fast the ice will melt, etc. These predictions are more like predicting the weather, and many computer models have been created to try and war-game different scenarios. However, the very simple theory and science shows that the temperature will continue rising as long as we continue to increase the CO2 concentration. That's about as hard as predicting what will happen if you freeze a full bottle of water or boil a pan of water.

You talk about "The Day After Tomorrow." Personally, I think anyone who bases a scientific discussion on a fictional work is not too smart. I haven't seen the movie, so I don't know anything about the science in it, but I seriously doubt it is good. I have little doubt that it does try to shock its viewers.

I believe that you are misrepresenting Sir David King's comments about "The Day After Tomorrow". He said it was "remarkably realistic, in parts," which leads us the question, which parts. He went on to say specifically, "The cooling caused by a weakened Gulf Stream would not actually counteract the general warming caused by increased greenhouse gases. Northern Europe is more likely to get warmer than colder." Thus, your contention that he ever made some case that the rapid freezing depicted in the movie would happen is false. Like I said, I didn't see the movie, so I have no idea what parts he thought were realistic, but any reading of his comments on the movie lets the reader know that the rapid freezing part wasn't one he thought was scientifically accurate. So, your whole article about "global warming alarmists" was based on an op-ed piece in a Bangladeshi paper and a Hollywood movie. I think your causes for alarm are a little unfounded.

On to cycles. We were specifically discussing global temperature, so I was referring to cycles in global temperature, not just any old cycles in the past 100 years. For that, the trend has been up from 1906 to 2006, with a plateauing between 1940 to 1975 or so. So, yes, cycles happen all the time. I happened to run two complete cycles in my washing machine just today. Strangely, though, no cycle in global temperature since the beginning of the industrial age, just an upwards trend.

We have little reason to believe that the Medieval Warm Period was anything more than a local weather phenomenon, not a global one, so I don't think this is very relevant. Global warming is just that. Warming on a global scale. Even if this is not true, and the Medieval warming was on a global scale, the theory of global warming does not preclude past warming for other reasons. It just says that we understand the current warming and why it is happening. If I take a bowl of water and place it outside, it will heat and cool based on a daily cycle. I could also use a hot plate to heat the water. Your objection is like saying that the hot plate couldn't cause the heating that we see when we turn it on because we've seen heating in the past that was caused by the sun.

Once again, you talk about how little CO2 there is, but you discount what an important greenhouse gas this is. Though it exists in much less of a concentration than H2O, it contributes 1/4 to 1/3 as much to the greenhouse effect as H2O does. Repeating that it is a trace gas doesn't change that. As I've also said repeatedly, if we agree global temperature is rising and that there is a knowable cause, then CO2 is an obvious choice, since we can also measure that it is increasing. H2O is a poor choice, since we can measure that it is not increasing. The sun is also a poor choice since we know it is currently at the bottom of its 11-year cycle. This is logic 101. Since you love the car analogy so much, I'll try to put it in terms you might understand. You go to a mechanic because your having trouble turning. The mechanic notes that your front left tire is very loose and wobbly and that the nuts need to be fastened. "WHAT?!" you exclaim, "this is a big car. The engine is lot bigger and important than those lug nuts. The problem must be there." You go to mechanic after mechanic insisting that the nuts could not be the problem. Finally, you find a mechanic that agrees. You pay him $3500 to fix your engine. After that, the problem continues, but at least you were right according to that last mechanic, so it was money well spent.

The first, and I feel most authoritative article from your Wikipedia cite is "The Earth's Annual Global Mean Energy Budget", published in 2006, and that gives 26% (the dead middle of my range), so I don't think my figure was incorrect. Even if it's 9% (the lowest possible given), that's still pretty significant, seeing that we've driven the concentration up by almost 25% in the past 100 years. So, at least we agree that CO2 is, by volume, much more important than H2O when contributing to global warming, and thus an equivalent volumetric increase in CO2 could drive a much greater temperature increase than H2O.

Skipping to the end, we have: "you must understand that there are authentic scientists on BOTH sides of this issue. The pro-global warming crowd does not have a monopoly on credible scientists."
Here's a partial list of scientific bodies that have endorsed the current theory of global warming based on the research and evidence to date:

US National Academy of Sciences
American Meteorological Society
American Geophysical Union
American Association for the Advancement of Science
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
Union of Concerned Scientists
NASA's Goddard Institute of Space Studies
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Environmental Protection Agency
Royal Society of the United Kingdom
National Center for Atmospheric Research
Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society

Who's on the other side? A few scattered scientists, most getting paid by the oil and gas industry? You sound very much like a cigarette company executive saying that they have credible scientists that question the link between cancer and smoking. The last credible objection to the evidence for global warming was that the satellite data didn’t match the surface measurements and didn’t show the warming trend. Much was made of this discrepancy by scientists that didn’t agree with the theory. However, the discrepancy was shown to be due to data collection (http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2005-08-11-global-warming-data_x.htm).

Now, we're finally to my favorite part. "The purpose is to address global warming as a political issue" followed by quoting the one time you use the word "political" in the entire article. Well, your intent would have been clearer if you'd actually discussed politics and policy instead of science. Let's pick out a few times in the article where you discussed science:

"Nature causes the earth's climate to vary. We know this, because historical and geological records tell us that the earth's climate has undergone wild fluctuations throughout the eons." Is this a political or scientific assertion?

"Global warming alarmists used to have the theory that humans were introducing so much greenhouse gas into the atmosphere that it was going to trap an inordinate amount of incoming solar radiation, which would warm the earth abnormally." Political or scientific?

"It was a logical scientific theory, but it was doomed because it cannot be proven that any warming in the earth's thermal regime is attributable to human activity and not the natural cycle." Political or scientific?

That takes us to the end of the second paragraph. I could go on, but I'd pretty much quote the whole article. If you want to discuss political issues, then do so, but don't get upset when I disprove your scientific assertions because you used the word "political" in one sentence.

Since you're graciously giving me the final word, and you've given me a nice segue for it, here it is. You, and countless others, are mixing the scientific debate about global warming with the political one. Because you don't like the potential policy consequences of the science, you attack the scientific basis for those proposed policies. You are convinced that the science must not be right, because, if it were not correct, then the policies based on that science would collapse. While this is a reasonable strategy while the science is still questioned, there is eventually a point where arguing in this fashion becomes counter-productive. As the science becomes accepted by more and more people and the evidence that the theory is correct stacks up higher and higher, basing disagreement on the idea that the science is not correct becomes more and more difficult.

I believe that if you were to examine this issue without any dog in the fight, you'd agree that the case for global warming as a result of increased CO2 in the atmosphere is very, very strong. However, because you fear the implications of that conclusion, you read and write articles questioning the science, highlighting any perceived minor anecdotal issue. Unfortunately, for you, this behavior is very counterproductive. If you don't like the policy propositions that are being made in response to the science, then spend your time arguing against them and promoting research into scientific solutions to the problem (e.g. http://yinyangtree.blogspot.com/2006/07/two-random-dispatches-about-global.html).

To illustrate this point, let's take a hypothetical future 10 years from now. Let's assume that, in 2016, we've had ten more years of increased temperatures and the public has accepted the theory of global warming as proven. What will happen at that point? Who will they trust to set policy to address the situation? People, like you or most Congressional Republicans, that chose to steadfastly refuse to accept the science or the people you currently term "global warming alarmists"? I think considering the answer to that question should be very important to you.

If all the scientific institutions that I mentioned above are correct about what they have researched, studied, debated, and written about for years now, that's the future that you are helping to bring about with every "scientific" critique of global warming that you write. The alternative is simple. Accept the science and support scientific research to find ways to counteract global warming. I personally think that this is the only solution that's going to work, but I fear you and people like you are handing the policy decisions to those who will *vainly* and *foolishly* try and restructure the world economy and its growth to solve this problem. I'm asking to re-examine the issue anew, with the idea that the problem can be real, even if the currently proposed solution is false.

Thanks for a stimulating conversation.

Tags: Global Warming

"Who's Next" Answered

2006-08-03T22:17:00.000-07:00

I've started my latest global warming debate with Mark A. Rose at his eponymous site. The first parts of this discussion are already being conducted in comments there, but I'm expanding the new discussions to blog posts here, since I think they're already very informative and because it's much easier to organize effectively here. Naturally, I also like as wide an audience as possible for my discussions, so this gives us one more avenue for hits.

One thing is for certain, Mark is a much better writer and thinker than Unreliapundit, so I don't expect any more of those types of dishonest shenanigans. I think we'll both make our points and learn a few things in the process, and that's all one can ever really hope for.

Tags: Global Warming

Two Random Dispatches About Global Warming

2006-07-28T23:22:00.000-07:00

Do you want to hear the good news or the bad news first?

The bad news? Ever hear of the Intermountain Rural Electric Association? I hadn't either until reading this ABC report on how they contributed $100,000 to Patrick Michaels to fund his continued skepticism of global warming. A commenter recently suggested that the scientific consensus on global warming was "manufactured by ignoring those who disagree," adding that, "it is also hard for those who disagree to get funding." When a small rural collective is ponying up 100 grand, it appears that the money flow is actually rather unrestricted. It is bought and paid for hacks like Patrick Michaels that allow the non-scientific skeptics a fig leaf of cover when they claim that the science is inconclusive. In the article, Ross Gelbspan sums up the consensus on global warming as "the conclusion of more than 2,000 scientists from 100 countries in what is the largest and most rigorously peer-reviewed scientific collaboration in history." I couldn't have said it better myself.

Enough of that; onto the good news. There may be real progress in scientific research to mitigate the effects of the added CO2 in the atmosphere. Paul Crutzen of the Max Planck Institute has written that adding sufficient sulfur to the proper level of the atmosphere could reflect more sunlight and thus counteract the greenhouse effect. I think that this type of solution is the only viable one for global warming. While we may be able to slow the growth of the rate at which we're expelling CO2 into the atmosphere, it is completely unrealistic to think that the volume will be reduced any time in the near future. Thus scientific breakthroughs to restore the balance are our best bet to head off global climate changes. The best part is that his suggestion involves using artillery to shoot the sulfur into the needed position, so all those who don't like to spend money unless things are being blown up should be very happy with this plan.

Tags: Global Warming

A Modest Abortion Proposal (Without the Swiftian Satire)

2006-07-22T15:13:00.000-07:00

The ever insane Unreliapundit continues to provide me with abundant blog-worthy material. One of his latest ideas is this gem about abortion:

"Embryo adoption is the solution - for pregnant women who don't want to go to term. Instead of aborting, they should give up their embryo for future adoption."

"Each side in the abortion debate - instead of financing political brawls - should finance medical research to make this a reality, and charities to make it a viable alternative for all women who have unwanted pregnancies."

"We could shut down EVERY ABORTION CLINIC, and re-open them as embryo extraction, freezing and adoption centers."

What's missing from this grand plan, besides the current funding and scientific knowledge that he notes as small problems? How about 400,000 wombs for the current embryos in storage, not to mention the additional ones for every potential abortion. The number of times this has been done through the Snowflake program is 81 so far over 7-10 years. That's not even keeping pace with a small fraction of the new demand.

Should I even mention that many women won't know that they're pregnant in time to make this work or that people should be able to determine how their genetic material is used. Nah, that'd be overkill...

Unreliapundit Runs Away Completely

2006-07-21T21:46:00.000-07:00

Even after all the victories that Unreliapundit handed to me in our debates (see previous posts), I didn't think that he would give me the ultimate vindication so quickly and easily. Solely because of his fear of me, he has turned off comments on his site. He is so incapable of responding to my arguments that he's not only "cheated and retreated," as is his wont, he's run entirely from the field of battle. As an added bonus, this was one day after posting the following:

WARS ARE WON WHEN THE ENEMY IS DEFEATED - UTTERLY, TOTALLY AND UNCONDITIONALLY.

Well, thanks, Unreliapundit. I guess I won our little "war," by your definition. You cried and whined and ran away. You deleted my factual posts on global warming, quietly dropped every lost argument to grasp at the next straw, and even with that, you still could make no headway against the truth. In order to silence my outlet for "correcting disinformation," you decided to cut off feedback altogether. This is why people like Unreliapundit cannot be trusted with our freedoms. You believe that protecting your reputation and ego is more important than anything.

Enjoy your re-insulated bubble of ignorance and cowardice. You obviously treasure it more than the truth, honor, bravery, or freedom of speech.

OK, who's next?

UPDATE -- Sunday, July 23rd After considering my post above, Unreliapundit has decided to retake the field and put his comments back up in a different format. I aplaud this decision. You can no longer post comments on particular articles, but in general sections. Naturally, all of my old comments and everyone else's who posted recently were lost in the purge. I've put my first new comment up. We'll see how long this lasts...

UPDATE -- Tuesday, August 1st Didn't last too long. My comment was "removed by administrator". Ahh, the expected cowardice. It is refreshing to be able to count on some things totally and completely.

The Latest Cut and Run Adherent: Unreliapundit

2006-07-19T19:52:00.000-07:00

I've been continuing my global warming "debate" with Unreliapundit over at the inappropriately named blog, "The Astute Blogger". I put "debate" in quotes since it's basically me pummeling him continuously with little resistance.

I think he's deleted my latest response 5 times now. It never ceases to amaze me how craven some of the war hawks can be. Here's a guy that calls for all out war on a daily basis, but is terrified by someone posting dangerous ideas on his blog. He's the first to turn tail and run when the going gets a little tough. If he thought his arguments were better, he'd be more than happy to leave mine up. It's only when he knows that he's beaten that he must delete posts. I guess I should be appreciative; he proves me right with every delete that he must issue and every thread he has to close off to opposing views. Here's the post that he keeps deleting because it's impossible for him to argue against:

"charcoal is not a proxy for fire-info; it is a direct result of fires."
Proxy data, is, by definition, data that measures the cause and relationship of two things indirectly. Like presence of oxygen with occurrence of wildfires being measured through the record of charcoal or the measurement of CO2 and temperature through ice cores. Below, we'll see how you are again relying on proxy data within a cite without realizing it.

"there is ample evidence that the proxies used to generate the info for the hockey-stick are not reliable. google it yourself."
Perhaps you're referring to some of the common misconceptions about the "hockey-stick" addressed in this article. If not, please actually name your objections to the model.

"co2 is variable, and not global. google it yourself"
"Variable, and not global." That doesn't even make sense. Did you mean globally variable? I'm not even sure what point you're trying to address here.

"i find it BIZARRE that folks like you who must accept that the left was wrong about just about everything, believes them on this."
Once again, you prove beyond the shadow of a doubt you arrived at your conclusions about global warming by reasoning backwards, not from reviewing scientific data. You don't like the solutions to global warming that the politicians on the left are pursuing, so you reason backwards that global warming must not exist. News flash -- global warming is not a political issue; it is a scientific one. I haven't arrived at my conclusions by listening to the left. I arrived at them by reviewing the science. Of course, when I've shown how you've been wrong in your interpretation of just about every scientific study, your response has been to ignore that you were wrong and move onto the next argument.

"when only 30 years ago they were hysterical about gloabl cooling."
This is a vast overstatement. The number of scientists that ever supported the idea of modern global cooling was nothing compared to the virtual consensus. From the article, "It is occasionally asserted that "in the 1970's, all scientists believed in global cooling" and therefore we should not believe in global warming now. However the scientific literature does not support this (see below); there is limited support from the popular press."

Also, you continue to ignore the 3 out of the 4 points in my last post. The string of unanswered challenges remains unbroken.

You've actually provided a good link with good science this time. Bravo. This is much better than when you try to draw your own conclusions on articles you don't understand like this original post or the Amazon "old trees" post.

The first thing that I note about this study is that it includes ... proxy data. From the study's introduction, "When reconstructing past climatic conditions from the ever increasing archives of natural proxies, itc is essential to establish rigorous statistical relationships between the proxy data and modern climatic observations." I guess you just can't stop citing things that rely on proxy data.

The only problem with this study as a predictor/indicator of global warming is that it doesn't control for the North Atlantic Oscillation and the variability it causes, like say, this
study.

As it says, "Using this region as an indicator of Greenland's temperature change that is related to global warming, we find that the ratio of the Greenland to global temperature change due to global warming is 2.2 in broad agreement with GCM predictions." You'll note that the Vinther paper cited in the article you point to understands the relevance of this and thus makes no proclamations about the relevance of their data to global warming.

I see you deleted my post (here it is again) and merely reprinted (without permission, I assume) the entire contents of the article you linked to. Yes, I already responded to that exactly. Of course, it's hard to tell when you cowardly delete my posts. Still no responses to any of my points though. Huge surprise, there.

I see that you're confusing the scientific, peer-reviewed paper by Vinther, et. al. with the unexamined ramblings of the writers of the article you linked to. If you go read the actual study produced by Vinther, NONE of their "What it Means" section is there. That's all post-fabrication. The reason is that Vinther knows about the North Atlantic Oscillation and the variability it causes. He has written entire papers on that. Therefore, this survey data is not valid for global warming analysis. Only a study that takes this into account would be good for that type of analysis. Did I already happen to provide one of those. Yes, I did. Does it show what I say it does? Yes it does. Is this clear to you? I seriously doubt it. Will you delete this post because you embrace cutting and running and cannot stand to be questioned? Signs point to "yes."

If you truly thought your argument was better, then you'd leave mine up. When you keep deleting it, you just prove me right again (and again and again).

So, I keep posting the direct answer to your article, and you keep simply repeating what the article says, deleting my response, and pretending that it doesn't exist. Look at the study. Are any of those conclusions there? Of course not. Because the scientists that did the study didn't draw those conclusions. They understand why the study I cited is usable as the "canary" and why yours is not.

The Always Humorous Unreliapundit on Global Warming

2006-07-16T00:01:00.000-07:00

Over the past few days, I've maintained a little one-sided debate with the man who calls himself "reliapundit" and posts at "The Astute Blogger." The debate topic was global warming. I first responded to a post of his from July 11th. In the original post, he was gleefully reporting on a petition of scientists that questioned global warming. Of course, this petition was the OISM petition from 8 years ago, but he reported it as if it were current news and not a discredited propaganda piece. When his petition was shown to be worthless and dated, he naturally apologized for putting up such a misleading story. Oh wait, that's not what happened. He ignored that and started to (weakly) argue why global warming was not correct. He had lots of previous posts on this topic, ranging from the standard party line to bizarre theories that he had come up with by misreading other blog posts and scientific reports. Here are a few of the highlights:

1. Unreliapundit: "The EU's Plank Institute chief scientist for atmosperic scince suggested that the major cause of earthj's warm ups is THE SUN."
My response: I assume that you're referring here to the 2004 study performed by the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research entitled "How Strongly Does the Sun Influence the Global Climate?" (of course, since you provide no link, it's hard to tell exactly what study you're referring to, but this seems like a good fit):
Max Planck Institute
Perhaps you'd like to consider the synopsis of that study on their website. It is, "Studies at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research reveal: solar activity affects the climate but plays only a minor role in the current global warming." To elaborate, they add, in the body of the report, "However, researchers at the MPS have shown that the Sun can be responsible for, at most, only a small part of the warming over the last 20-30 years. They took the measured and calculated variations in the solar brightness over the last 150 years and compared them to the temperature of the Earth. Although the changes in the two values tend to follow each other for roughly the first 120 years, the Earth’s temperature has risen dramatically in the last 30 years while the solar brightness has not appreciably increased in this time."

2. Unreliapundit:"there are MANY warmiong periods throughout history BEFORE indistrilaizaton. Before any man-made inputs"
My response: Obviously, this contention is true. I don't think that anyone is advocating that greenhouse gases are the ONLY factor that can cause global warming. The argument is that increased greenhouse gases in the atmosphere do cause temperature increases, though those certainly could be mitgated or enhanced by other factors. As an analogy for your argument here, let's say that we take a bowl of water, put it outside, and track its temperature over time. We find through our measumements that it gets warmer during the day and cooler at night. We have established that there are "warming periods" and "cooling periods" for the water based on a natural cycle, similar to your claim above. Now, we take a hot-plate, heat the water, and observe a temperature increase. By your argument, we should discount the effect of the hot plate on temperature since we have already seen that the water temperature can rise and fall based on other factors and conclude that we're simply "AGAIN HAVING ONE OF TGHOSE WARM UPS" that we noted daily before the hot plate was in place.

3.Unreliapundit:"co2 hand man-made "greenhouse gases" has STEADILY increased since 1840 but temperatures have not"
My response:Perhaps you and I have different definitions of "steadily increased." For methane and CO2, there are basically bends in the graphs that change the slope of the increase at about 1950. Given the nature of industrialization and its spread around the globe, I think you'd be hard pressed to support that the percentage increases of greenhouse gases from 1840-1850 bore any resemblance to those from 1995-2005.

4. Unreliapundit: "Other research has suggested that vines tend to grow particularly fast in response to higher CO2 levels, and that vines are increasing in abundance all over the planet."
My response:First, let me point out that you’re conceding here that higher CO2 levels are in fact going up all over the planet. You then go on to claim that homeostasis will be reached because increased levels of CO2 will cause increased CO2 sequestration. But you provide no evidence that the percentage increase in plant growth and thus sequestration is the same as the CO2 increase. For example, let’s say that every 100% increase in CO2 caused a 5% increase in plant growth and an equal 5% increase in sequestration. This doesn’t give homeostasis, it gives a 5% slower increase in CO2 than you would have had without that effect. You say that there can be no crisis because of this, but that’s obviously untrue. The simple fact that you already conceded that CO2 levels are, in fact, rising all over the plant shows that homeostasis is not being reached.

5. Unreliapundit: "And then there's this FACT: As CO2 levels increased from 1940-1970, global temperatures DECLINED; this is DISPOSITIVE PROOF; increases in atmospheric CO2 cannot cause global warming."
My response:Wait, didn’t you just say that there have been eras of warming and cooling? Might those make it possible that a cooling trend in 1940-1970 depressed that greenhouse gasses might have otherwise had? Looking at the trend between 1900 and 2000, the warming is pretty pronounced. While there is a lull in the otherwise steady increase between 1940 and 1970, the percentage change during that time is clearly within the general parameters of the temperature record before the gases. What is different than before is the dramatic increase from 1900-2000 even with the 1940-1970 period taken into account. First you argue that fluctuations like this are common, then you argue that just this type of fluctuation could not possibly explain the 1940-1970 changes. Perhaps you should think more about which argument that you’d actually like to present before arguing against yourself in back-to-back paragraphs. Here’s the temperature graph again, in case you’ve forgotten:

6. Unreliapundit: "If this is true, then as the Amazon forest has been allowed to AGE, it has become less efficient at absorbing atmospheric CO2 - at CO2 uptake, and this means more CO2 stays in the atmosphere every year as a result. The increase of atmosphreric CO2 over the last 100 years might be a result of this - the aging of the Amazon - and NOT INDUSTRIALIZATION OR ANYTHING "MAN-MADE."
My response:Your assertion here is ludicrous on its face for two main reasons. 1) The original article merely points out that the forest has less capacity to absorb CO2. So, all this shows is that man-made increases in CO2 have one additional reason that they are an INCREASED factor in climate change. There is one factor that is not mitigating them as much as previously thought. Therefore, man-made release of CO2 is having an even greater effect than previously thought. 2) You claim that the Amazon "has been allowed to age" and is therefore "less efficient". But that's not what the article says at all. It isn't that something that man has done has changed the nature of the forest. It's just that the understanding of how old the trees in the forest were was not correct. When scientists calculated their true age, the result of their calculations didn't release a cloud of CO2. The Amazon trees have long been absorbing at this rate. It's just that the rate was misunderstood. There is nothing at all to suggest that "more trees are older now than ever". The age is just better understood now. What from the article makes you think that the trees are actually living longer now. This is typical of your style of argument. You read something and misunderstand it, but you resist and cry when someone points out what should have been totaly obvious in the first place.

7. Unreliapundit: "the ALPS fuchrissake were GREEN when attila crossed them! and he didnlt use no fucking SUV's you shithead!"
My response:I think that you might mean "when Hannibal crossed them" instead of "Attila." Not that I expect you to admit that you were wrong or anything.

8. Unreliapundit: "all the man-made gloabl warming jerks are brainwashed dupes of Leftism; they were brainwashed by marxist anti-industrial anti-capitlaist academmics since thew 1970's. I know: i was RAISED by themn abd grew up among them. by the people who founded earth day. commies. people who think that indusrtialization and capitalism are bad and that ludditism and protectionsm and socialism are good. BWAHAHAHAHA!
My response: None except, "WTF!?" This guy is completely off his rocker and needs to see a psychoanalyst about his relationship with his parents. He mentions them on his blog a lot and can't seem to get over them. His entire psyche appears to be a reaction/rebellion to his upbringing, as the above shows. It's kind of strange when the person you're debating on a scientific issue starts talking about his commie parents and their Marxist brainwashing and then goes on to accuse you of being off-topic.

Those are my favorites. There are plenty more nuggets in the original debate. Shortly after receiving his fifth or sixth consecutive rhetorical beatdown, unreliapundit decided to give up and start deleting my posts instead of responding. A true cut-and-runner if ever there was one. I reposted them all (for the moment) on his site, but I'll include the full text of the whole thread below in a separate post for posterity.

I swear that this guy is for real and that this is not a parody site of the right. He is actually this clueless, weak, and pathetic. Linkers to previous posts of Unreliapundit include Capt.'s Quarters, Hugh Hewitt, Instapundit, Powerline, RCP, Roger L. Simon, Michele Malkin, and The Corner.

Blow By Blow with Unreliapundit on Global Warming

2006-07-15T23:27:00.000-07:00

Original Reliapundit Post
THEY'VE SIGNED A PETITION SAYING THAT MAN-MADE GLOBAL WARMING IS FAR FROM PROVEN. (VIA NO PASARAN.)

I THINK THEY'RE RGHT, AND THAT THE LEFT IS PUSHING "MAN-MADE GLOBAL WARMING" BECAUSE THEY ARE BASICALLY ANTI-FREE-MARKET AND ANTI-INDUSTRIAL, AND BECAUSE THEY BELIEVE THAT THIS IS A WAY FOR THEM TO RAISE TAXES AND GET MORE INVOLVED IN THE MARKETPLACE.

THE VERY THOUGHT OF WHICH MAKES LEFTISTS SALIVATE.
# posted by reliapundit : 6:29 PM

Comments:
According to Scientific American;

Scientific American took a sample of 30 of the 1,400 signatories claiming to hold a Ph.D. in a climate-related science. Of the 26 we were able to identify in various databases, 11 said they still agreed with the petition—one was an active climate researcher, two others had relevant expertise, and eight signed based on an informal evaluation. Six said they would not sign the petition today, three did not remember any such petition, one had died, and five did not answer repeated messages. Crudely extrapolating, the petition supporters include a core of about 200 climate researchers – a respectable number, though rather a small fraction of the climatological community.
# posted by Senori : 8:03 PM

SEND A LINK SENORI OR I WILL DELETE THE COMMENT.

I SUSPECT THAT THE SA COLUMN YOU QUOTE IS ABOUT ANOTHER PETITION, BUT THERE IS NO WAY FOR ME TO CHECK IT OUT.

DID YOU USE THE LINK I PROVIDED?
# posted by reliapundit : 8:14 PM
http://www.sciam.com/page.cfm?section=sidebar&articleID=0004F43C-DC1A-1C6E-84A9809EC588EF21

It's the same study, the one by the OISM.
# posted by Senori : 9:50 PM

sneori - thanks for the link!

here's how it loos to me:

1 - your link is too an iddy-biddy blurb, not a researched article.

2 - the blurbs CLAIMS that 26/1400 of the CLIMATE SCIENCE phd's - or a measly inconsequential 2% - were contacted.

3 - of these, 42% still agreed with the petition.

4 - 6 of the 26 - or 23% of those contacted would not sign today.

4 - the iddy-biddy blurb you linked to calls what it then does " CRUDELY EXPTRAPOLATING" ----

[this seems to me to be VERY VERY VERY APT --- it's just what the econazis do with the warming data!]

to allow the sciam blurbist to GUESS that the of the 1370 climate scientists it didn't bother to contact, only 200 are climate researchers firmly in the anti-Gore camp.

which is utter BULLSHIT.

and WEAK BULLSHIT.

And proves that leftist econazis such as YOU SENORI are grasping at straws.

17,000 of the 17,000 signatories are SCIENTISTS who know junk science when they see it. and bullshit when they smell it.

WAKE UP!

Stop swallowing the lefist bullshit.

all they really want to do is TAX everything and then decide whio will get their largesse.

they will tax all the shit they don't like: industry, trade, etc.

it's all simply a leftist power grab,

and it's the road to serfdom.
# posted by reliapundit : 10:19 PM

My first post
One reason that a lot of scientists, including climatologists, doubted global warming in general was that the atmospheric temperature data didn't jibe with the other data and showed no warming trend. That was true until recently, when errors with that data were discovered that explained the discrepancy.

http://www.wbcsd.org/plugins/DocSearch/details.asp?type=DocDet&ObjectId=MTkwNzY

or

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2003019908_jetstreams26m.html

Since this was a recent development, it tends to invalidate petitions from 5 years ago when this was still a very valid, debatable point of contention that a lot of skeptics hung their hat on.
# posted by Joe Yangtree : 4:13 AM

Did I say 5 years ago? I meant 8. The petition mailing was done in 1998, and there's a lot of water under the bridge (so to speak) since then.

http://www.scottchurchimages.com/enviro/ccgwpp.asp

Also, as noted in this article, Arthur Robinson concedes that it's very hard to actually validate the petition signatures at all, so the whole exercise is really more of a publicity stunt than a meaningful scientific document. If qualified scientists actually doubt global warming, then they should write some peer-reviewed papers extoling this viewpoint. They seem to be getting beaten rather badly on that score.
# posted by Joe Yangtree : 4:25 AM

joe:

there is DISPOSITIVE PROOF on man-made gloabl warming:

1 - co2 hand man-made "greenhouse gases" has STEADILY increased since 1840 but temperatures have not; from 1040-1970 tems DECLINED.

if man-made gases cause/increas gloabl warming then this would be IMPOSSIBLE.

it disporves the entire theory.

ALSO:

2 - there are MANY warmiong periods throughout history BEFORE indistrilaizaton. Before any man-made inputs.

THIS SUGGESTS THAT WE ARE AGAIN HAVING ONE OF TGHOSE WARM UPS.

The EU's Plank Institute chief scientist for atmosperic scince suggested that the major cause of earthj's warm ups is THE SUN.

Kinda makes a little sense, don't it!?

BOTTONLINE: the left loves the idea of man-made gloabl warming because it gives them an excuse to raise taxes and interfere with the free market and with industry. this is theirREAL agneda. always has been even when they were warning the world about GLOBAL COOLING in the 1970's!!!!!!!!!!
# posted by reliapundit : 7:47 PM

'pundit:

First, I see no rebuttal in your response for my points about the petition, so I assume you're conceding those. That's fine, the actual global warming debate and evidence is much more interesting, anyway.

I believe your exact challenge to Senori was, "SEND A LINK SENORI OR I WILL DELETE THE COMMENT." I'd like to request that you live up to your demanded standards and provide the scientific support for your twin claims that "co2 hand man-made "greenhouse gases" has STEADILY increased since 1840 but temperatures have not; from 1040-1970 tems DECLINED" and "there are MANY warmiong periods throughout history BEFORE indistrilaizaton. Before any man-made inputs".

Even before you do so, I'll go ahead and address your points.

1) "co2 hand man-made "greenhouse gases" has STEADILY increased since 1840 but temperatures have not"
Perhaps you and I have different definitions of "steadily increased." For methane and CO2, there are basically bends in the graphs that change the slope of the increase at about 1950. Given the nature of industrialization and its spread around the globe, I think you'd be hard pressed to support that the percentage increases of greenhouse gases from 1840-1850 bore any resemblance to those from 1995-2005.

http://www.umich.edu/~gs265/society/greenhouse.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming

Also, according to the National Academy of Science, in a report from June of this year, "there is sufficient evidence from tree rings, retreating glaciers, and other "proxies" to say with confidence that the last few decades of the 20th century were warmer than any comparable period in the last 400 years"

http://www.nationalacademies.org/morenews/20060622.html

These correlations look pretty good to me. Obviously, the theory of global warming and the data behind it are two different things, but they seem to match pretty well in this case, but I'd like to see your interpretation of the data and objections to the standards set above before commenting further.

2) "there are MANY warmiong periods throughout history BEFORE indistrilaizaton. Before any man-made inputs"
Obviously, this contention is true. I don't think that anyone is advocating that greenhouse gases are the ONLY factor that can cause global warming. The argument is that increased greenhouse gases in the atmosphere do cause temperature increases, though those certainly could be mitgated or enhanced by other factors such as .

As an analogy for your argument here. Let's say that we take a bowl of water, put it outside, and track its temperature over time. We find through our measumements that it gets warmer during the day and cooler at night. We have established that there are "warming periods" and "cooling periods" for the water based on a natural cycle, similar to your claim above. Now, we take a hot-plate, heat the water, and observe a temperature increase. By your argument, we should discount the effect of the hot plate on temperature since we have already seen that the water temperature can rise and fall based on other factors and conclude that we're simply "AGAIN HAVING ONE OF TGHOSE WARM UPS" that we noted daily before the hot plate was in place.

You go on to claim under this sub-point that, "EU's Plank Institute chief scientist for atmosperic scince suggested that the major cause of earthj's warm ups is THE SUN." I assume that you're referring here to the 2004 study performed by the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research entitled "How Strongly Does the Sun Influence the Global Climate?" (of course, since you provide no link, it's hard to tell exactly what study you're referring to, but this seems like a good fit):

http://www.maxplanck.de/english/illustrationsDocumentation/documentation/pressReleases/2004/pressRelease20040802/

Perhaps you'd like to consider the synopsis of that study on their website. It is, "Studies at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research reveal: solar activity affects the climate but plays only a minor role in the current global warming." To elaborate, they add, in the body of the report, "However, researchers at the MPS have shown that the Sun can be responsible for, at most, only a small part of the warming over the last 20-30 years. They took the measured and calculated variations in the solar brightness over the last 150 years and compared them to the temperature of the Earth. Although the changes in the two values tend to follow each other for roughly the first 120 years, the Earth’s temperature has risen dramatically in the last 30 years while the solar brightness has not appreciably increased in this time." What has also risen dramatically in the last 30 years? Look back to point 1.

Also, I'd love to see one shread of support for your contention that scientists worldwide support the theory of global warming because of their desire to "interfere with the free market and with industry." Why separates this assertion from any other ridiculously baseless conspiracy theory?
# posted by Joe Yangtree : 2:30 AM
jhoe joe joe joe: there you go again!

the proof that the left is using so-called man-made global warming to raise tazxes anbd control markets is KYOTO and every othetr scheme they themselves propose: like higher gasoline taxes andf credits for other non co2 producing energies.

here are links to things which

DISPROVE the co2 global warming link:

http://astuteblogger.blogspot.com/2006/05/scientific-experiment-proves-that.html

http://astuteblogger.blogspot.com/2006/06/global-war-versus-global-warming.html

http://astuteblogger.blogspot.com/2006/05/even-more-proof-global-warming-is-not.html

http://astuteblogger.blogspot.com/2006/03/man-made-global-warming-hysteria-is.html

http://astuteblogger.blogspot.com/2006/06/more-proof-that-polar-snow-and-ice.html

http://astuteblogger.blogspot.com/2006/02/more-proof-that-global-warming-is-tree.html

http://astuteblogger.blogspot.com/2006/03/if-we-really-want-to-improve.html

http://astuteblogger.blogspot.com/2005/12/aging-amazon-forest-causing-increase.html

http://astuteblogger.blogspot.com/2005/11/ice-cores-prove-climate-change-has-had.html

http://astuteblogger.blogspot.com/2005/08/250-million-years-ago-global-warming.html

ALSO" JOE - the "proxie evidence is bogus.

man-made global warming is a hoax.

global warming has occurred before; it is natural. the geo-climate is not static; it has never been

most of these conditons like the arctiv and fuji and kilimanjaoro are LOCAL not global. kilimanjaro has be melting soince 1900.

the ALPS fuchrissake were GREEN when attila crossed them!

and he didnlt use no fucking SUV's you shithead!
# posted by reliapundit : 8:48 PM

Thanks for the links to your other posts. I don’t have time to go through them tonight, coax out your best arguments and refute them, but when I do, we’ll see if they are as meticulously researched and studied as your claim about the "Plank Institute." I immediately noticed that you totally ignored that point in your follow-up. Of course, you ignored just about everything that I said, but I wanted to highlight that one in particular. That was an example where you made a claim and I showed that it was plainly, irrefutably untrue. Instead of conceding the point or correcting your own disinformation (a bold claim on your manifest, btw), you chose to pretend that it never happened. I advise a quick reading of Luke 6:41-42 for you. Correcting disinformation should start at home.

So, you claim that “the proxie evidence is bogus.” Why is that exactly? What scientists claim that is true. I assume that this is more than just your studied opinion, but you certainly give me little to go on besides a raft of links to your own site. Please actually make an argument that what you say is true instead of just saying it. If you have a relevant point, please highlight it and explain the relevance.

You say, “global warming has occurred before; it is natural. the geo-climate is not static; it has never been.”
Didn’t I address this with my analogy about the bowl of water in my last post? Oh yes, I did. Your response is just to ignore that and say the same thing over again. Obviously, “the geo-climate is not static.” Clearly, “global warming has occurred before.” Yes, it’s true, there is no single factor that determines climate. No one is arguing these points. The actual relevant point of contention is that one of the factors that DOES influence climate is the presence of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and one of the things that causes greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is the activity of man. At the present time, man is contributing greater and greater amounts of these gases to the atmosphere and it’s causing an increasing warming trend. In the past, there have certainly been other warming trends with other causes. Right now, the correlation (which you had questioned and I showed with my specific links) between the rising levels of greenhouse gases and the rising temperature is very well documented. Of course, this is just another point that you declined to address in your response.

Finally, back to your conspiracy theory. You are conflating two different issues here. The first is global warming and the science behind it. That’s all we’ve argued about. The second is policy decisions driven as a response to global warming. Scientists determine the former, politicians and policy makers the latter. If you don’t like the potential policy implications of global warming being true, then you should argue against those. You instead decide that since you don’t like the potential political/economic consequences that the science behind them must be false. So, my question remains. Why do you think that the thousands of scientists that support the theory of global warming have a “desire to interfere with the free market and with industry.”

Let me propose an alternative possibility. The scientists have no ulterior motive and, right or wrong, they believe that their theory is correct. Additionally, let’s say that the “left” sees this problem, and chooses to respond to it with their standard tools of taxes, market control, subsidies, etc. After all, when all you’ve got is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. That explains just as much as your theory and no one has to resort to any giant conspiracy between the scientists and politicians, making mine much more structurally sound.

It’s hilarious that you posted today on the insanity of conspiracies, yet you propose this as a possibility, which would be a much larger, coordinated conspiracy than most of the ones you rightly denigrate.

Oh, and I think that you might mean “when Hannibal crossed them” instead of “Attila.” Not that I expect you to admit that you were wrong or anything.
# posted by Joe Yangtree : 2:42 AM

OK, it’s still early, and the first one two are quite easy, so we’ll do them tonight, just to show good faith on my part. I certainly hope your other 8 are better than these.

#1: http://astuteblogger.blogspot.com/2006/06/global-war-versus-global-warming.html
The initial premise here is "A RECENT SCIENTIFIC EXPERIMENT HAS PROVEN THAT INCREASES IN ATMOSPEREIC CO2 LEVELS CAUSES INCREASES PLANT GROWTH." Fine. Makes sense.

The quoted article goes on to say, "Other research has suggested that vines tend to grow particularly fast in response to higher CO2 levels, and that vines are increasing in abundance all over the planet." First, let me point out that you’re conceding here that higher CO2 levels are in fact going up all over the planet. You then go on to claim that homeostasis will be reached because increased levels of CO2 will cause increased CO2 sequestration. But you provide no evidence that the percentage increase in plant growth and thus sequestration is the same as the CO2 increase. For example, let’s say that every 100% increase in CO2 caused a 5% increase in plant growth and an equal 5% increase in sequestration. This doesn’t give homeostasis, it gives a 5% slower increase in CO2 than you would have had without that effect. You say that there can be no crisis because of this, but that’s obviously untrue. The simple fact that you already conceded that CO2 levels are, in fact, rising all over the plant shows that homeostasis is not being reached.

#2. http://astuteblogger.blogspot.com/2006/06/global-war-versus-global-warming.html
Wow, all your same rhetoric that I’ve already addressed. Quick re-summary:
"it is a FACT that the globe has had many MANY eras of warming and cooling, ALL before SUV's or man-made ‘greenhouse gases.’"
Yes, if I go burn down a tree would you deny the man-made cause? Trees have burned down before man ever existed due to natural causes. Just because I specifically set this one on fire with a match is no reason for you to believe that it wasn’t a lightning strike that did it. Just because something happened in the past for one reason doesn’t mean that it can’t happen again for a different reason. Except for you, I guess.

"And then there's this FACT: As CO2 levels increased from 1940-1970, global temperatures DECLINED; this is DISPOSITIVE PROOF; increases in atmospheric CO2 cannot cause global warming."
Wait, didn’t you just say that there have been eras of warming and cooling? Might those make it possible that a cooling trend in 1940-1970 depressed that greenhouse gasses might have otherwise had? Looking at the trend between 1900 and 2000, the warming is pretty pronounced. While there is a lull in the otherwise steady increase between 1940 and 1970, the percentage change during that time is clearly within the general parameters of the temperature record before the gases. What is different than before is the dramatic increase from 1900-2000 even with the 1940-1970 period taken into account. First you argue that fluctuations like this are common, then you argue that just this type of fluctuation could not possibly explain the 1940-1970 changes. Perhaps you should think more about which argument that you’d actually like to present before arguing against yourself in back-to-back paragraphs. Here’s the temperature graph again, in case you’ve forgotten:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Instrumental_Temperature_Record.png

Of course, none of your claims in this article have any evidence or links to back them up. They’re just your own empty assertions. There’s not really anything here at all except the same old rhetoric and faulty logic.

That was fun. I look forward to the rest.
# posted by Joe Yangtree : 3:34 AM

The truth about global warming - it's the Sun that's to blame

By Michael Leidig and Roya Nikkhah
(Filed: 18/07/2004)

Global warming has finally been explained: the Earth is getting hotter because the Sun is burning more brightly than at any time during the past 1,000 years, according to new research.

A study by Swiss and German scientists suggests that increasing radiation from the sun is responsible for recent global climate changes.

Dr Sami Solanki, the director of the renowned Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Gottingen, Germany, who led the research, said:

"The Sun has been at its strongest over the past 60 years and may now be affecting global temperatures.

"The Sun is in a changed state. It is brighter than it was a few hundred years ago and this brightening started relatively recently - in the last 100 to 150 years."

Dr Solanki said that the brighter Sun and higher levels of "greenhouse gases", such as carbon dioxide, both contributed to the change in the Earth's temperature but it was impossible to say which had the greater impact.

Average global temperatures have increased by about 0.2 deg Celsius over the past 20 years and are widely believed to be responsible for new extremes in weather patterns. After pressure from environmentalists, politicians agreed the Kyoto Protocol in 1997, promising to limit greenhouse gas emissions between 2008 and 2012. Britain ratified the protocol in 2002 and said it would cut emissions by 12.5 per cent from 1990 levels.

Globally, 1997, 1998 and 2002 were the hottest years since worldwide weather records were first collated in 1860.

Most scientists agree that greenhouse gases from fossil fuels have contributed to the warming of the planet in the past few decades but have questioned whether a brighter Sun is also responsible for rising temperatures.

To determine the Sun's role in global warming, Dr Solanki's research team measured magnetic zones on the Sun's surface known as sunspots, which are believed to intensify the Sun's energy output.

The team studied sunspot data going back several hundred years. They found that a dearth of sunspots signalled a cold period - which could last up to 50 years - but that over the past century their numbers had increased as the Earth's climate grew steadily warmer. The scientists also compared data from ice samples collected during an expedition to Greenland in 1991. The most recent samples contained the lowest recorded levels of beryllium 10 for more than 1,000 years. Beryllium 10 is a particle created by cosmic rays that decreases in the Earth's atmosphere as the magnetic energy from the Sun increases. Scientists can currently trace beryllium 10 levels back 1,150 years.

Dr Solanki does not know what is causing the Sun to burn brighter now or how long this cycle would last.

He says that the increased solar brightness over the past 20 years has not been enough to cause the observed climate changes but believes that the impact of more intense sunshine on the ozone layer and on cloud cover could be affecting the climate more than the sunlight itself.

Dr Bill Burrows, a climatologist and a member of the Royal Meteorological Society, welcomed Dr Solanki's research. "While the established view remains that the sun cannot be responsible for all the climate changes we have seen in the past 50 years or so, this study is certainly significant," he said.

"It shows that there is enough happening on the solar front to merit further research. Perhaps we are devoting too many resources to correcting human effects on the climate without being sure that we are the major contributor."

Dr David Viner, the senior research scientist at the University of East Anglia's climatic research unit, said the research showed that the sun did have an effect on global warming.

He added, however, that the study also showed that over the past 20 years the number of sunspots had remained roughly constant, while the Earth's temperature had continued to increase.

This suggested that over the past 20 years, human activities such as the burning of fossil fuels and deforestation had begun to dominate "the natural factors involved in climate change", he said.

Dr Gareth Jones, a climate researcher at the Met Office, said that Dr Solanki's findings were inconclusive because the study had not incorporated other potential climate change factors.

"The Sun's radiance may well have an impact on climate change but it needs to be looked at in conjunction with other factors such as greenhouse gases, sulphate aerosols and volcano activity," he said. The research adds weight to the views of David Bellamy, the conservationist. "Global warming - at least the modern nightmare version - is a myth," he said. "I am sure of it and so are a growing number of scientists. But what is really worrying is that the world's politicians and policy-makers are not.

"Instead, they have an unshakeable faith in what has, unfortunately, become one of the central credos of the environmental movement: humans burn fossil fuels, which release increased levels of carbon dioxide - the principal so-called greenhouse gas - into the atmosphere, causing the atmosphere to heat up. They say this is global warming: I say this is poppycock."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/07/18/wsun18.xml&sSheet=/news/2004/07/18/ixnewstop.html

"JOE YANGTREE": you are a fool and an ass and a dupe and willfully ignoring FACTS which DISPROVE man-made global warming.

I have NEVER issued any "conspiracy" theory.

all the man-made gloabl warming jerks are brainwashed dupes of Leftism; they were brainwashed by marxist anti-industrial anti-capitlaist academmics since thew 1970's.

I know: i was RAISED by themn abd grew up among them.

by the people who founded earth day.

commies.

people who think that indusrtialization and capitalism are bad and that ludditism and protectionsm and socialism are good.

BWAHAHAHAHA!

these leftioes think tthat Throd World poverty was caused by colonialism. BWAHAHAHA!

What lifted the West/First World out of overty and short life expectancy awas INDUSTRILIZATION and CAPITALISM.

All the Third World needs is FACTORIES AND MORTGAGES. And an end to First World WELFARE which ends up beiong wasted on sicialism or pocketed by corruopt INDIGENOUS regimes.

LIKEWISE: lefties like you, Austin-Joe, blame UNFETTERED indutrialism and caplitalism FOR "THE END OF THE WORLD!!!!!/global warming.

And you want to FETTER industry and capital.

this urge to fetter industry and capitalism lies beneath the IDEOLOGICAL and pseudo-scientific BS of man-made global warming.

in 1972 the same lefies said industrilism and capitalism would lead to GLOABL COOLING. published in ramparts ansd new3sweeek. and they said it would lead to MASS STARVATION OF BILLIONS BY 1984!

Bwaha haha ha haha ha.

Just as wrong as when they - the LEft -said that Reagan's deployment of Pershings to Europe would lead to WW3!

Just as wrong as when the Left said that ending wlefare woiuld lead to hundreds of thousnands living in the streets!

And the Bush tax cuts lead to a depression or recession or HUGE UNFILLABLE DEFICITS.

Well, the economy is BOOMING and the deficits declinging, and the deficits were NEVER as high as those we had in the 1980's - and we survived them JUST FINE THANK YOU.

so, stupid joe: i just gottta LAUGH when i hear the left crying abiut dire risks.
the left has always been worng.

as you are now.

BTW: an increase in atmospheric CO2 might be UNRELATED to man-made causes.

I have blogged REPEATEDLY that the Amazon is the oldest it has ever been, and therefore it is binding up less CO2 than ever.

this may cause more CO2 to be in the atmosphere. but bottom-line: it will be bound up elsewhere: by vines, plankton, etc.

so idiots like you and gore can stop worrying.
# posted by reliapundit : 10:42 AM

So, you've gone from the bold claim, "The EU's Plank Institute chief scientist for atmosperic scince suggested that the major cause of earthj's warm ups is THE SUN," to "The Sun has been at its strongest over the past 60 years and may now be affecting global temperatures. Quite the retrat from your initial claim. Thanks for tacitly admitting that your initial claim was based on ignorance of what the study actually said.

You continue to ignore that the very same Max Planck Institute clarifies their conclusions with the following quote that I already supplied you above: "However, researchers at the MPS have shown that the Sun can be responsible for, at most, only a small part of the warming over the last 20-30 years." Please take this quote of theirs and examine it. Tell me how it possibly supports your position. Please note that YOU were the one who brought up the Planck Institute as YOUR supporters. I merely showed you that wasn't the case. My experts support me and your experts support me. What more can I possibly ask for.

You claim that I'm "willfully ignoring FACTS which DISPROVE man-made global warming." Strange, it seems that I'm the one continually presenting the facts about global warming that you ignore. We'll see how you do this time. You seem to think that deficits, Reagan's missile policy, etc. are relevant to the science here. They're not.They're just smoke, but I guess that's all you've got.

I'm sorry that you had such a troubled childhood, but who you were raised by actually has little bearing on the evidence for global warming. Thanks for sharing, though. You clearly demonstrate that your core, unshakable belief is "the left has always been worng". Science, evidence, logic, etc. are irrelevant to you. You have faith in the incorrectness of the "left" and therefore it is sufficient to simply believe the opposite of anything that they do. Using your criteria I could argue that you were wrong about what the Planck Institute says and/or who Hannibal/Atilla were, so you can't possibly be right now. But, I actually prefer to argue relevant points instead of beating straw.

I personally have no desire to fetter industry and capital. You believe that everyone who disagrees with you holds the exact same views. We don't. I think that the global warming problem will HAVE to be sovled scientifically. There is simply no way that we will be able to stop the world from producing greenhouse gases at ever increasing rates, especially for the short term.

You say I have NEVER issued any "conspiracy" theory. yet you have equate global warming with the CIA being a drug cartel and 9/11 being an inside job. The latter two are generally regarded as conspiracy theories. Additionally, you state that "man-made global warming is a hoax." So, if it's a hoax being perpetrated by thousands of scientists, then one would logically conclude that they are conspiring together to create this hoax. hy isn't this a conspiracy theory?

I'm sure that I'll get to your Amazon blogs soon, but I already addressed the binding up argument above. I do love the comment, "the Amazon is the oldest it has ever been." Yeah, so is everything else. That's how time works. It goes forward and things get older.
# posted by Joe Yangtree : 9:35 PM

Dr Sami Solanki, the director of the renowned Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Gottingen, Germany, who led the research, said: "The Sun has been at its strongest over the past 60 years and may now be affecting global temperatures.
# posted by reliapundit : 10:44 AM
1- the FACt that the amazom is the oldest ever is SCIENTIFIC: UC Irvone just finished the largest survey ever of the Amazon and determined that more trees are older now than ever.

2 - other planets in the solar system are gettiung warmer - a further indication that the cause is SOLAR and not man-made. see here:

http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/2006/07/global-warming-becomes-contagious.html

3 - please leave me alone, joe: you are a boring dupe.

why not get your own blog and comment there instead of putting your inane off-point idiot comments on mine.
# posted by reliapundit : 8:52 PM

google uc irvine and/or amazon at my blog.

and then stay away. you boring dupe.
# posted by reliapundit : 8:55 PM

OK, onto the Amazon question, since it's the only one of your original points you still seem to think is valid and would like to argue instead of just deleting my points.

Here's your link on the subject:
http://astuteblogger.blogspot.com/2005/12/aging-amazon-forest-causing-increase.html
From the original Scientific article:
"Because their trees are old and slow-growing, the Amazon forests, which contain about a third of all carbon found in land vegetation, have less capacity to absorb atmospheric carbon than previous studies have predicted. Although some of the largest trees also grow the fastest and can take up carbon quickly, the vast majority of the Amazon trees grow slowly."

Your conclusion based on this:
"If this is true, then as the Amazon forest has been allowed to AGE, it has become less efficient at absorbing atmospheric CO2 - at CO2 uptake, and this means more CO2 stays in the atmosphere every year as a result. The increase of atmosphreric CO2 over the last 100 years might be a result of this - the aging of the Amazon - and NOT INDUSTRIALIZATION OR ANYTHING "MAN-MADE."
Your assertion here is ludicrous on its face for two main reasons. 1) The original article merely points out that the forest has less capacity to absorb CO2. So, all this shows is that man-made increases in CO2 have one additional reason that they are an INCREASED factor in climate change. There is one factor that is not mitigating them as much as previously thought. Therefore, man-made release of CO2 is having an even greater effect than previously thought. 2) You claim that the Amazon "has been allowed to age" and is therefore "less efficient". But that's not what the article says at all. It isn't that something that man has done has changed the nature of the forest. It's just that the understanding of how old the trees in the forest were was not correct. When scientists calculated their true age, the result of their calculations didn't release a cloud of CO2. The Amazon trees have long been absorbing at this rate. It's just that the rate was misunderstood. There is nothing at all to suggest that "more trees are older now than ever". The age is just better understood now. What from the article makes you think that the trees are actually living longer now. This is typical of your style of argument. You read something and misunderstand it, but you resist and cry when someone points out what should have been totaly obvious in the first place.

The main issue that you always dance around is that there are lots of potential factors that affect global climate. Concentration of greenhouse gases is one of those factors. The level of atmospheric CO2 has increased dramatically over the past 100 years and temperatures have as well. Scientists hypothesized the greenhouse effect in the 1930's and evidence gathered over that period along with the analysis of historical data has confirmed that it is indeed a factor in climate change. Anyone with any knowledge of science understand that man's industrialization has both produced more CO2 (and other greenhouse gases) and reduced the planet's ability to absorb them by reducing overall vegetation. This is why all the scientific articles you come up with basically agree with me. Because this is a settled point. The relevant questions are related to how to stop and/or reverse the progress of the change and those are very debatable points. But arguing whether man-made global warming exists is like arguing that the fossil record doesn't support the theory of evolution. The only people who bother to even make such arguments are those who have to assume that they're right (religous zealots) and work backwards from there.
# posted by Joe Yangtree : 1:17 AM
why not get your own blog and comment there instead of putting your inane off-point idiot comments on mine.
We have different opinions here on what is good, reasonable, and effective. You prefer to post cockamamie ideas and be unchallenged. If you are challenged, you petutantly try and argue your points, move onto other arguments when those prove indefensible, beat up a few straw men, blame your parents for your shortcomings, give up, delete posts, whine, cry, and beg me to leave you undisturbed in your own little bubble where you can continue to believe what you want without facts getting in the way. Did that cover the cycle of your beahvior? Let me know if I left anything out.

I, on the other hand, like to have my ideas challenged. I learn the most when actively arguing and researching points,seeking to understand what the other side has to offer. It's true, you're a weak opponent, but many of your points have gained traction in the media/blogosphere, and I like to see what's under them and how well they can be backed up. Of course, you have a few bizarro theories that are all your own, with nothing at all to back them up, so it's kind of nice to dig into and expose those, too.

And OK, I admit it is fun to see how quickly I can make you cut, run, and beg for mercy. But that's really just a bonus. I believe that 4 days from original post to total capitulation on your part is a new personal best. So, thanks, that's always rewarding.

By the way, please point out where I am off-topic. Every point I have argued is directly in response to your posts. You're the one that keeps wanting to move the discussion to new realms after getting beaten on the last (or onto your parents(!?) or Reagan's Pershing missles). That's fine with me. I have no complaints about your shifting the playing field to where you think you have an advantage, since I demonstrate again, every time that you're still wanting. Grasp at new straws all you like. I love the desperation. Just try not to be so whiny when I slap each thin reed from your hand.

I'm sorry that I've once agin beaten you up so badly that you have to take the coward's way out, but I understand that it's a lot easier for you to ignore evidence than it is to argue your points coherently. Of course, the easiest way for you to continue your willful ignorance is to delete my posts and encourage me to stop posting. So, I'll keep at you for awhile longer. Ignorance should at least be made to be uncomfortable if it can't actually be remedied.
# posted by Joe Yangtree : 1:21 AM