quote:

Originally posted by Steve_M:
As far as I can see, the only reason for wanting to know all this guff is that "carbon footprints" are measured in tonnes of CO2 or tonnes of carbon. So if you know you use 1000 litres of petrol a year you can use the figures to help you calculate your carbon footprint. Other than that, there is no reason for knowing the information, so I don't quite know what APL is getting upset about - it is not an ideological argument.

Perhaps we could make it into one by measuring carbon footprints in microgrammes so that the numbers sound bigger.

Granted but if you wish to generalise in order to make a point then it works both ways. You then need to recognise that if my arguments are idealogical then so are those that claim that CO2 is the main cause of anthropogenic global warming - give that in context CO2's role in GW is small and the anthropogenic content is negligible.

But it seems to me that many of the pro-AGW arguments happily move from the general (or ideological) to the precise in order to support their AGW argument oblivious of the compounded inaccuracies in between.

That should have read:

"You then need to recognise that if my arguments "are idealogical then so are those that claim that CO2 is the main cause of global warming - give that in context CO2's role in GW is small and the anthropogenic content is negligible.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by TrueSceptic:


In case anyone thinks I'm being rude or agressive to APL, I do this only when appropriate, i.e. when someone is rude or agressive first, or when they display know-it-all arrogance despite lacking even basic understanding of a subject.

[QUOTE]

You're too polite to this APL character. What was meant to an informative post to numptie has deteriorated to the usual "down with the greenies" rubbish.

Based on plain physics/chemistry there's an extra watt per square metre due to the extra CO2. That's GW. That's it. Cut. The end.

APL wanna dance? Do the foxtrot oscar?

quote:

Originally posted by realprimate:
Based on plain physics/chemistry there's an extra watt per square metre due to the extra CO2. That's GW. That's it. Cut. The end.

Compared the suns energy (including fluctuations) of between 350 - 650 Wm2 it is insignificant - but you failed to mention that in your point.

You see this is the typical pro-AGW politicised trick of emphasising only a one-side truth.

quote:

Originally posted by realprimate:
APL wanna dance? Do the foxtrot oscar?

Nice!!!

quote:

Originally posted by realprimate:
You're too polite to this APL character. What was meant to an informative post to numptie has deteriorated to the usual "down with the greenies" rubbish.

Is it any wonder when clearly intelligent people can argue about compounds and molecular weight etc. express reasonable arguments on the subject - then have the apparent inability to see the insignificance of natural CO2 and anthropogenic CO2 to the heating of the planet.

The only conclusion has to be that you refuse to acknowledge the insignificance because it goes against your beliefs.

numptie and others need to see this too, they need to see that GW is not cut'n'dried the 'debate is not over' because there are many gaps in the AGW theories that are often being whitewashed over.

As for 'down with the greenies' that's your own doing. The fact that 'greenies' are responsible in trying to stifle and end the debate, call sceptics 'deniers' and even comparing them to 'holicaust deniers' in some cases and are selective in and over emphasise data to put their AGW theories in the worst possible light, and exaggerating claims in order to spread alarm in an ill-informed public - sums it up.

quote:

Originally posted by APL:

quote:

Originally posted by realprimate:
You're too polite to this APL character. What was meant to an informative post to numptie has deteriorated to the usual "down with the greenies" rubbish.

Is it any wonder when clearly intelligent people can argue about compounds and molecular weight etc. express reasonable arguments on the subject - then have the apparent inability to see the insignificance of natural CO2 and anthropogenic CO2 to the heating of the planet.

The only conclusion has to be that you refuse to acknowledge the insignificance because it goes against your beliefs.

numptie and others need to see this too, they need to see that GW is not cut'n'dried the 'debate is not over' because there are many gaps in the AGW theories that are often being whitewashed over.

As for 'down with the greenies' that's your own doing. The fact that 'greenies' are responsible in trying to stifle and end the debate, call sceptics 'deniers' and even comparing them to 'holicaust deniers' in some cases and are selective in and over emphasise data to put their AGW theories in the worst possible light, and exaggerating claims in order to spread alarm in an ill-informed public - sums it up.

Good post APL.
It seems to me that people always get intelligence muddled up with what one could call being a 'whole person'. The two should always be kept very separate. Very often, people who clearly display a capacity to digest and analyse material, will then ab-use that material (and its sources) in order to support their most deeply held, infantile fantasies. In fact a level of intelligence - or cleverness - has no bearing at all on a persons unresolved 'wish' to get rid of anything in the real world which they find an obstacle to returning it to some sort of fantastical 'Garden of Eden'. The recent event of the two highly qualified doctors who allegedly smashed their jeep into Glasgow airport testify to how powerful these these regressive fantasies are.

Time and again on this site, we witness people who are obviously quite capable of rational thought and a certain degree of separation from their environment, spoilt by their urgent felt-need to realise a common daydream. Hence their surprising decent into base name-calling ('denier' etc), an embarrassing finger-pointing at any real object in the world that displays signs of adulthood ('development', 'growth', relationship etc), and their demand to return our wonderfully sophisticated and technology-driven existence to some unspecified (and unspecifiable) version of Teletubbies land.

It's fruitless trying to influence these people because - as I say - for them, information is ALWAYS brought into the service of the fantasy - rather than being used to challenge the fantasy as a means of development. All we can do is rest assured that it is the latest variant of an age-old and well documented aspect of human nature... that some people will always waste their lives away seeking to find ways of returning to a Utopia.

Is it any wonder when clearly intelligent people

[Me? You got that wrong!]

can argue about compounds and molecular weight etc. express reasonable arguments on the subject - then have the apparent inability to see the insignificance of natural CO2 and anthropogenic CO2 to the heating of the planet.
[??? Without it the Earth would be frozen solid solid solid]


The only conclusion has to be that you refuse to acknowledge the insignificance because it goes against your beliefs.

[If it’s right I’ll acknowledge it]


numptie and others need to see this too, they need to see that GW is not cut'n'dried the 'debate is not over' because there are many gaps in the AGW theories that are often being whitewashed over.

[There’s gaps but the absence of evidence isn’t the evidence of absence]


As for 'down with the greenies' that's your own doing. The fact that 'greenies' are responsible in trying to stifle and end the debate

[Debate? According to Time magazine “the serious debate has quietly ended”]


, call sceptics 'deniers' and even comparing them to 'holicaust deniers' in some cases and are selective in and over emphasise data to put their AGW theories in the worst possible light, and exaggerating claims in order to spread alarm in an ill-informed public - sums it up.

[Last alarmist remark I read was in last month’s edition of National Geographic. The glaciologist said "In 1995, when we predicted the disappearance of the glaciers, very few people believed us," Ramírez says. "We were accused of being alarmist. But now it has come to pass."]

Keep talking APL – you’re making my case. And I don't know where you got those 350-650 numbers from. Christmas cracker?

quote:

Originally posted by Roger58:
Good post APL.

Thanks! If such things were only down to non-scientists but unfortunately they are not.

You might find this interesting, I have posted it elsewhere but it is relevant here also as it highlights this very subject.

IPCC AR4: No skill in scientific forecasting

Realprimate

quote:

[??? Without it the Earth would be frozen solid solid solid]

Precisely and without all the negative feedbacks like cloud cover, convection of latent heat from the surface etc arising because of the CO2 induced heating it would be many tens of degrees hotter.

This debate on a scientific level is about whether the increases in CO2 caused by burning of fossil fuel will really create a significant increase in global temperature and adverse climate change. As I keep emphasising it's not just about CO2 it's about a whole host of known and possibly unknown forcings and feedbacks and the subtle balance between them.

On other levels it's about political opportunism by some to remove growth from humanity and return to some sort of green fantasy world ete etc.

quote:

Originally posted by APL:

Compared the suns energy (including fluctuations) of between 350 - 650 Wm2 it is insignificant - but you failed to mention that in your point.

Those numbers might mean something but you haven't told us what they relate to: the yearly variation at a specific latitude? The variation averaged over the earth's surface? Over what time period? Care to tell us?

quote:

You see this is the typical pro-AGW politicised trick of emphasising only a one-side truth.

One side[d]? If the evidence points one way then that is the "right" side.

quote:

Originally posted by TrueSceptic:

quote:

Originally posted by APL:

When does 44 = 44/12?

When does 273kg = 367kg?

You need to tell me where any of that comes from.

I'm still waiting.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by realprimate:

[Last alarmist remark I read was in last month’s edition of National Geographic. The glaciologist said "In 1995, when we predicted the disappearance of the glaciers, very few people believed us," Ramírez says. "We were accused of being alarmist. But now it has come to pass."]
QUOTE]

Where? Where have the glaciers disappeared? LOL. If Ramirez was a scientist he would realise many of the 'disappearing' glaciers are uncovering mines, paths, settlements that the destroyed when they advanced during the little ice age. I think you need to evolve to a higher primate before you comment here.

quote:

Originally posted by Billy Bumbly:
[QUOTE]Originally posted by realprimate:

[Last alarmist remark I read was in last month’s edition of National Geographic. The glaciologist said "In 1995, when we predicted the disappearance of the glaciers, very few people believed us," Ramírez says. "We were accused of being alarmist. But now it has come to pass."]
QUOTE]

Where? Where have the glaciers disappeared?

[Look at my finger. Thataway]

LOL. If Ramirez was a scientist

[Edson Ramírez, a Bolivian glacier researcher who is his country's leading expert on glaciers]


he would realise many of the 'disappearing' glaciers are uncovering mines, paths, settlements that the destroyed when they advanced during the little ice age.

[Any evidence for that? Given the nature of a glacier to grind everything down on their downward slide those settlements must be made of tungten carbide. (Iron age settlements?)]

I think you need to evolve to a higher primate before you comment here.

"Real" will do me fine thanks.

quote:

Originally posted by Son of Mulder:

you'll see that the Annual smoothed series reflects a 21 point binomial filter on the raw data. Below that is the Annual data with a best fit which looks pretty flat to me over the last 5 years.

Bring on the smoke and mirrors.

Here's the NASA temperature anomalies which show an upward trend. If people are saying it's magically levelled off since 1998 or whenever then that's not even smoke and mirrors.

Well maybe the mirrors you get at a fairground and make me look slim. Where can I buy one for me and the wife?

quote:

Originally posted by Son of Mulder:

So which should I believe? The 2nd graph (titled Annual series) from the met office or the 5th graph (titled Global Monthly Mean Surface Temperature Change) from Nasa?
.

Either I suppose - the long term trends are clear enough. The met office have plenty on global warming and trends.

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/research/hadleycentre/models/modeldata.html

You're not suggesting the met office forgot to read their own graphs?

quote:

Originally posted by Mubbers:
Clearly the Earth is getting a little warmer it's the mechanism/consequences that are in dispute here!

I'm not even sure I agree that. Parts of the Earth (probably the majority) is warming, but some parts are static and some are cooling. The idea of some global earth temperature is an artificial one, and as such an index has to be created to measure it. There are many ways of putting together such an index, and I could undoubtedly create one (albeit a rather silly one) which showed the Earth's temperature to be falling.

You don't need to create a silly method to prove "global cooling" because Ross McKitrick has already invented one. Even his mate Steve McIntyre, the other member of the anti-hockey team thinks that argument is bogus.

quote:

Originally posted by Steve_M:
You don't need to create a silly method to prove "global cooling"

I wasn't going to, but the fact that it is possible indicates that a "global" temperature is an artifical construct, and measuring it is therefore dependent upon the construction of an index. I could raise legitimate concerns about the indices I see being used.

Personally, I think we should just wait until it gets so hot that we all expire. That would prove it!

quote:

Originally posted by realprimate:

quote:

Originally posted by Son of Mulder:

So which should I believe? The 2nd graph (titled Annual series) from the met office or the 5th graph (titled Global Monthly Mean Surface Temperature Change) from Nasa?
.

Either I suppose - the long term trends are clear enough. The met office have plenty on global warming and trends.

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/research/hadleycentre/models/modeldata.html

You're not suggesting the met office forgot to read their own graphs?

Graphs again. Please please please give me some figures so that the output of their impressive and complex modelling can be compared with reality.

quote:

Originally posted by Lucibee:
Personally, I think we should just wait until it gets so hot that we all expire. That would prove it!

That might take a little while. In the meantime, enjoy the cool weather.

It might not be so long. I don't actually think we should wait, but is that what you think we should do, JL?

In a field, one summer's day, a Grasshopper was hopping about, chirping and singing to its heart's content. An Ant passed by, bearing along with great toil an ear of corn he was taking to the nest.
"Why not come and chat with me," said the Grasshopper, "instead of toiling and moiling in that way?"
"I am helping to lay up food for the winter," said the Ant, "and recommend you to do the same."
"Why bother about winter?" said the Grasshopper; "We have got plenty of food at present." But the Ant went on its way and continued its toil.
When the winter came, the Grasshopper had no food and found itself dying of hunger - while it saw the ants distributing every day corn and grain from the stores they had collected in the summer. Then the Grasshopper knew: It is best to prepare for days of need.