Climate Change: are we screwed?

General Chit Chat
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Hi @bert. When I spoke of being an equal opportunity skeptic, I was referring only to the science. There is science to the climate, of which I am interested. It’s just that I am irritated that the scientific method has been abandoned with what is being called “climate science” today.

Your point that so much time and resources have been totally wasted is true. The only thing I will add to that is that man has proved to be a very poor steward of our home. Man has proved beyond any doubt that he is impotent to bring any actual change to this or any other critical situation. Something greater is needed.

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@oldgeek Gaaahhh! That’s not a a polite response to a lady when age is revealed! :astonished:…meh,good thing I’m not a lady :wink: I just saw where that was going and I’d rather be given credit for full on idiocy or willing compliance with agenda 21 if that’s what’s thought rather than my views be discounted as a result of being ‘just young’. That said, I’m very immature for my age …and a lot of work went into that thankyouverymuch :stuck_out_tongue:

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@oldgeek … indeed, something greater is needed. Why not … go back to real science. We both have seen the progressive corruption of science and the universities in our lifetimes. Going from being driven by the quest for truth to the quest for funding. Funding that comes with target results. Not just target areas of research (already bad science), but also target results (unforgivable corruption). Climate ‘science’ is totally corrupted, up to the point that the ‘scientists’ are not just cherry-picking the wanted results, they actively change data (which is fraud).

More general, I think what we need is an equivalent of Hippocrates’ oath (I’ll tentatively call it the Ockham/Einstein oath).

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Ah, a Faux Pas? Better than when one has an opposed father which is a Foe Pa! :upside_down_face: Perhaps I should have said that it doesn’t seem more than 528 months ago.

This reminds me of what a friend told me some 240 months ago. She was in her 60’s and I thought I would flatter her by saying she was 49. She said “oh Greg, no. No! If a woman lies about her age, she should always say that she is older than she actually is. That way people look at her and will say ‘she looks great!’ whereas if she says she is younger than she is, people will say ‘my, she looks tired’”.

I thought that was great wisdom. Which is why, when purchasing something, I ask if there is a discount for those from the Spanish-American war! :crazy_face:

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Amen, brother, Amen!

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Ha ha! That’s one, mark my words, I’m going to work in next time I see my niece and nephew!:smile: Great comedy should always be benchmarked on whether or not it will go over with seven year and nine year olds! Oh also, I am tired…very tired. Fullstop. There’s nothing I can do to lie about that anyhow and, quite honestly, I wear these baggy tired eye bags with pride :slight_smile: 1975 baby, the year Rocky Horror Picture Show was released! Sh_tshow it was, it was still entertaining! I f*cking worked hard for these eye bags and I feel bad for the gen Ys who are working just as hard but don’t have the eye bags to prove they have been when it’s insinuated otherwise :frowning: That being said,I know the world doesn’t share my perspective and you’ve helped me make a decision I’ve been wrestling with for the last couple days, so thanks for that :slight_smile:

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I guess there are some brave professionals that are calling for what I’ve been asking for. A true debate (Audiatur et altera pars). It kind of smacks against the “all scientists agree” meme. https://clintel.nl/brief-clintel-aan-vn-baas-guterres/

But, of course the propaganda machine will kick in and try to discredit these 500+ scientists.

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From the link provided:

Several of these are directly paid, or indirectly, by oil and coal companies. I will provide evidence if required.

Tobacco companies spent millions trying to confuse the risk on cigarettes. Their are many types of cancer after all. Can we show cigarettes are significant?

The climate has changed over time but:
Sun activity has reduced,
We are farther away from the Sun than usual
Why are we hotter?

There may be a cause but I have yet to hear a creditable argument.

Source required. Nature published in March that it’s faster.

I’ll accept here no model is perfect but nothing better has been offered. It is also not a bad fit if not ideal.

Take a look at Venus, way too hot for life. too much is bad we need some as plants to break down into organic molecules. Otherwise we would have no food, CO2 is increasing at an alarming rate.

No comment but take a look yourself.

Agreed but no economy can exist on a destroyed planet which will no-longer support life.

I may be stepping on toes here but I have studied climate change over the last 20 years so feel I have something to add to the conversation.

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This same reasoning can be applied to scientist that are used by climate alarmists to support their position. Disregarding someones work, not because of the work, but because of politics or some other reason, is itself a classic propaganda move. Such propaganda shuts down discourse and therefore the scientific method is being totally disregarded. Thus the validity of what is being called ‘climate science’ is questionable at best. This is very disappointing. I will not pretend that my prejudices do not affect my judgement. The former head of Green Peace had some interesting comments about climate. My initial reaction was to dismiss him because he is what I would consider an idiot when it comes to GMO’s and pesticide. But I consciously put my feelings aside to consider what he said. I have learned an idiot in one area does not necessarily mean an idiot in all areas.

Models being used today have been tested. Past data has been used to see what these models would predict as to what the climate would be today. Consistently the models predict that it would be warmer today than it actually is. There is one model that is an exception. It is the model software that Russian climatologists use. It’s predictions have it pretty close to what the climate is now. Can you guess if that software is being used by policy makers?

Should we be afraid of a glass of water because one can drown in an ocean? Optimal plant growth requires CO2 levels to be over twice what they are now. Venus is a whole different situation.

Some of this depends on perspective. What I mean is framing of the issue. One example is that the frequency and intensity of hurricanes in the Atlantic has decreased over the last century. However, the human cost has risen. So, is it actual number and intensity of events or the human cost? Now, data shows that earthquakes have been increasing in number and intensity over the last few decades, but it would be a great stretch to blame that on climate change. :smile:

I understand that you are concerned about the future of our home. I am too. However, there is data that shows in the past the Earth being much warmer than it is now and life was fine. Now will man poison our home in other ways? He sure is working on it!

I do hope that the scientific method will be resurrected when it comes to climate science. I believe that hope is in vain though.

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Or, you know, facts.

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William, things can be ambiguous for me at times. I sure can be thick. Please explain your motivation for this.
Thank you.

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To be honest I was not aware of this meme but I understand the relevance. A link may be useful.

I understand why there is confusion about climate change. Few of us have scientific degrees and too many are trying to confuse issues for commercial reasons.

I don’t want to attack Greg @oldgeek here : I am sure he is going on the best information he has.

My Physics PHD and BsC in climate science are.giving me different evidence however.

Happy to provide raw data to anyone who wants to see it.

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My geophysics MSc and 30+ years experience in modeling complex systems tell me otherwise. The models are not OK, they fail miserably and should have been dismissed a long time ago. Good science is a continuous process of trying to make your models fail. And they do fail, in all areas. No prediction made has ever got there (except with a little ‘help’ - we call that ‘fraud’). You can make all the scare scenarios you want, if the observations refute your models, you have to scrap them.

I’d say it is by now proven that there is no global warming. If you pump that many billions in trying to find the ‘right’ correlations, then you will find a few. Unfortunately, this amount of funding also attracts the kind of people who are not interested in reproducible research or data integrity. Result: large scale fraud. They try to cover up by saying this is ‘homogenization’, and by God have I done a lot of those. But you do NOT get to pick a very small number of chosen instruments - it’s the original sin in real science. Research it and see that’s exactly what they do. No wonder literally all homogenizations are going in the wanted direction (i.e. to ‘prove’ that there is warming).

But hey, it’s all irrelevant. You are fighting on the wrong side. Could you just try to imagine a world where fighting global warming is not a good cause? What if the people pushing it don’t care sh*t about nature, but you just want to set up a whole new economy based on carbon tax, outdated energy generation methods and fake arguments for ‘sustainability’? For their own profits. The banks like it too - new streams of credits! Then research and find what this ‘Climate Change’ issue has done to real nature protection. Like protecting habitats against fire and chainsaws?

The impact is negative, due to the gobbling up of hard needed funds, and the disgusting ‘renewables’. Real nature is disappearing, and the last people that actually are out there trying to save what’s left will tell you: extra CO2 is not the problem, temperature is not the problem. Fire and chainsaws are.

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@Bert am not going to make an appeal to concensus. I assume you would agree that at least the published views of most climate scientists think global warming is an issue.

That said science must be evidence based so I would be interested to be pointed towards any relevant credible studies on the matter.

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Of course most climate scientists think it’s an issue. Why wouldn’t it be? But as always, quantity does matter. If we contribute a few tens of degrees things are radically different from a few degrees, right?

Not working in Academia, I approach this from an engineering perspective. Just saying we are all doomed is nonsense. You have to be more specific with real data and arguments. Then, what are you going to do about it? If the answer is laid out in ‘Paris’, then stop right there because the proponents of AGW-catastrophe will agree that it costs a lot and does unmeasurable tiny bits of ‘good’. Why waste so much money on things that don’t work by anyone’s standard?

I find it incredible that you need refs from me, counterarguments should be common knowledge. Anyway, here’s a recent one that can hardly be ignored:

https://arxiv.org/pdf/1907.00165.pdf - “No experimental evidence for the significant Anthropogenic Climate Change”

We have proven that the GCM-models used in IPCC report AR5 cannot compute correctly the natural component included in the observed global temperature. The reason is that the models fail to derive the influences of low cloud cover fraction on the global temperature. A too small natural component results in a too large portion for the contribution of the greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide. That is why IPCC represents the climate sensitivity more than one order of magnitude larger than our sensitivity 0.24°C. Because the anthropogenic portion in the increased CO2 is less than 10 %, we have practically no anthropogenic climate change. The low clouds control mainly the global temperature.

In the end, we need to choose. Chase the speculations of a money-hungry industry (the energy giants, banks, the sustainability lobby) or do we actually want to preserve the nature we still have? Cutting CO2 is harmful and brings absolutely nothing useful (actually, more CO2 is very likely highly beneficial for nature). Easy choice. Choose nature - fight climate alarmism …

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I need to examine the linked document in detail and will respond soon once I have examined it claims. I hope I am wrong on climate change.

As yet I remain to be convinced but I approach this with an open mind.

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Whatever your findings are, this is my key message:

If the ‘catastrophe’ position is right, then we’re doomed anyway; no effective action is taken anyhow.

If that position is wrong, then we have enriched a small group of parasites at the cost of nature and our societies.

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Any sincere efforts to help me be humble are appreciated. :slight_smile:

But I’m just a guy that might be able to find his backside if he has a map, compass, gps and uses both hands. Might!

I’m also one that is watching this circus from outside the cage. Or maybe I’m the monkey inside the cage watching. Either way, I am not a climate denier nor am a climate alarmist. I am someone who, by observation and pieces of information that has come my way, is seeing that when it comes to climate science, the scientific method is definitely not there. And that disappoints me. If, by proper methods, it is determined that the climate is warming because of man’s activities, I’m fine with that conclusion. And fine with a different conclusion, as long as the scientific method is observed. Being that it has not been followed, the legitimacy of climate science is, at best, seriously questioned.

What is being presented is hardly facts. It is at best a surmise, a conjecture, based on what is probably highly selected data. If this would be another field, “facts” would be a word not used at all. However, that would go against the propaganda campaign at foot here. (That Guardian article, cited above, would be very useful in Propaganda 101)

So, data being manipulated. Here is three charts. Two from a Tony Heller, a climate denier and one from Micheal Mann, a climate alarmist.

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Mr. Heller’s source of data is from NOAA’s website. Mr. Mann’s data is from, well, only Mr. Mann knows because he has refused to divulge the source. Mr. Heller’s graphs give the impression that temperatures have been in decline for over a century. Maybe you don’t get the same thought that I did, but I see this as a example of data manipulation, or data selection, that it is certain data picked to give a desired impression. (And this is after Mr. Heller makes the point of how data can be used to make any point one wants to!!) Now, where in Mr. Mann’s chart is the medieval warming period, a time that was as warm, if not warmer than today? It is clear that he also manipulated data, probably why he refuses to reveal the data he used.

Data manipulation has been common in many fields over the years, and it would be foolish to think that climate science is immune. It is easy to say that the professionals that one does not agree with manipulates data. But it would be very naive to think that the side one does agree with doesn’t do that.

That is why the scientific method is critical. It is like a system of checks and balances. This is lacking in climate science today. In fact I’ve heard of informal discussions with younger climate scientists that are skeptical of the prevailing views. They work in an environment of intimidation and fear. They are intimidated in that they will be ridiculed if they express their opinions and live in fear that if they do, they will lose their position. I have no problem believing these antidotal accounts, observing the environment that climate science is in. One doctor went so far to say “shut up already, it’s science.”