Climate Change Skeptic Results Released Today 776
Irishman writes "A leading climate change skeptic, Richard Muller, will release results today showing that global warming is indeed happening. He has shown that two items skeptics look to, urban heat islands and unreliable weather stations, do not skew the data. The amazing part is that this research is funded by the Koch brothers, two investors who fund climate change skeptics whenever possible."
Rather than pointing the finger at the Koch bros (Score:4, Informative)
Instead of making grandiose statements that the Koch brothers fund global warming skeptics "whenever possible", why not link to their official position [kochind.com] on global warming and what we should/shouldn't do about it?
Never a Global Warming Skeptic (Score:5, Informative)
Re:where is the actual disagreement? (Score:4, Informative)
Actually, the sceptics have been claiming that temperatures have not been rising. Muller's study exists entirely because of their refusal to accept that idea.
Re:Muller is the biggest skeptic the world. (Score:5, Informative)
That's neither here nor there, since it has been widely demonstrated that if you actually plot his data, you will find that there has been no warming for the last ten years, contrary to the statements he has made to the press:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/10/29/uh-oh-it-was-the-best-of-times-it-was-the-worst-of-times/ [wattsupwiththat.com]
Now the denialists are denying the denialists' study because it conflicts with denialism! LOL!
Actually when I first read about this study, I thought it didn't contribute anything new, and was just repeating past experiments under Koch funding to rule out any possibility of bias due to TEH GLOBAL AGW CONSPIRACY!
But this study is actually based on a much more robust data set than any other before in history, so it at least more concretely proves the observed warming record:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204422404576594872796327348.html [wsj.com]
Re:Rather than pointing the finger at the Koch bro (Score:5, Informative)
On the said website:
Koch companies believe in the efficient use of all resources and are committed to maintaining a clean and healthy environment. But we also think there should be open and honest debate about climate change and the likely effects of proposed climate policies on the energy that drives the productivity of our society. In recent years, a vocal group of self-declared environmentalists has repeatedly insisted that our planet is in peril because of man-made greenhouse gases. Many take their cues from Al Gore’s 2006 documentary “An Inconvenient Truth,”...
Seems the new tack is to say that it happens after all, but all those who said so before are sensationalists and "so-called environmentalists"...
By the way, about Muller's turnaround: How to make yourself a reference in a field where you have no competence? First deny forcefully and get headlines, then say that after careful verification, you found out the truth. Don't forget to continue to berate the real scientists treating them as sensationalists!
And further by the way, the Koch brothers do fund denialists (not skeptical as they claim) research and are the funders (and true founders) of the Tea party.
Who modded the parent up?
Re:Different thing (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Different thing (Score:4, Informative)
Warming isn't bad for the earth, the earth doesn't care. The earth was completely molten at least twice, and it got through those hot flashes just fine (albeit, to be fair, those were several billion years ago).
Warming is bad for humans, at least humans who live close to sea level or who depend on doing their farming where they've always done their farming and don't feel like moving.
Re:Different thing (Score:4, Informative)
The prominent skeptic in question was the author of the research that was revealed last week.
Title of the TFA: Richard Muller, Global Warming Skeptic, Now Agrees Climate Change Is Real
The problem is that the supposed skeptic is not a skeptic at all. Here [grist.org] is what he said in 2008:
The bottom line is that there is a consensus -- the [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change] -- and the president needs to know what the IPCC says. Second, they say that most of the warming of the last 50 years is probably due to humans. You need to know that this is from carbon dioxide, and you need to understand which technologies can reduce this and which can't. Roughly 1 degree Fahrenheit of global warming has taken place; we're responsible for one quarter of it. If we cut back so we don't cause any more, global warming will be delayed by three years and keep on going up. And now the developing world is producing most of the carbon dioxide.
I'm not a climatologist. All I can base my opinion on is what I read and what I make of what I read. On one side, I see global warmongers saying that those that don't believe in Global Warming are flat-earthers and science obviously proves that GW is happening and it's all man's fault. On the other side, I see "skeptics" claiming that Global Warmongers are government supported scientists looking for grants and anti-capitalists looking to gain power. Who is telling the truth?
I find it really difficult to believe that Global Warming believers are telling me the truth when they trot out guys like this claiming that a skeptic has seen the light and all who are non-believers should follow his lead. After all, who can give a more non-biased story than a climate skeptic to begin with, right. The problem is, as I've stated, is that this guy was NEVER a climate skeptic and those that say he was are lying to my face. Why should I believe anything else the warmongers tell me?
More:
Do you consider yourself an environmentalist?
Oh yes. [Laughs.] In fact, back in the early '80s, I resigned from the Sierra Club over the issue of global warming. At that time, they were opposing nuclear power. What I wrote them in my letter of resignation was that, if you oppose nuclear power, the U.S. will become much more heavily dependent on fossil fuels, and that this is a pollutant to the atmosphere that is very likely to lead to global warming.
Yeah... This guy is no "skeptic". Why do the Global Warming believers need to lie to me if the science is as solid as they say it is?
No peer review; not "science" (Score:3, Informative)
This report has not been peer-reviewed, and no one should draw any conclusions yet. The "pre-publication" of this report is reportedly the work of the report's primary author; none of the co-authors were consulted. The Daily Mail is reporting that one of the co-authors, Prof Judith Curry, has even begun to distance herself [dailymail.co.uk] from the report. I predict that nothing good will come of this pre-publishing gambit; this entire approach will confuse rather than clarify, and real science will bear yet another black mark.
Re:A co-researher disagrees (Score:5, Informative)
Judith Curry is frantically backpedalling on her blog, having been fooled by the Mail reporter, David Rose, who has prior form, see:
http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2010/12/rosegate_rose_does_to_data_wha_1.php
And the rest of the article turns out to be a misrepresentation too:
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2011/10/30/judith-curry-opens-mouth-inserts-foot/
Re:I wonder (Score:5, Informative)
What they've confirmed is that there was indeed a warming trend from about 1970 (or so) through about 2000. Before that, nothing significant. Since then, nothing significant. So we have a 30-year period of warming. That's an extremely short period when you're talking climate science. It also inconveniently doesn't match up with carbon dioxide emissions growth.
The data before the 1970s correlates with carbon dioxide emissions growth when you take into account sulfur dioxide emissions which cool the earth.
There is plenty of other evidence that carbon dioxide levels are a major influence on the earth's temperature. The question isn't if man made emissions affect the climate, but how much will man affect the climate. I would love to debate what to do about it, but It is pretty hard to do that when their is a significant portion of population who flat out denies basic science.
Re:Different thing (Score:4, Informative)
The issue is not *that* climate is changing. It's *how fast* climate is changing.
The last time Earth experienced a GHG surge and corresponding temperature rise and ocean acidification analogous to what we're now creating was the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM). It left the world such a different place that we declare what followed a new geological era (the Eocene).
We're currently quite busy creating the Anthropocene.
Re:Different thing (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Different thing (Score:3, Informative)
Actually there are several more, try this list
The main one is probably the last one. There are a bunch of rich guys like the Koch brothers who own large parts of the politicians and believe that they will be able to buy their way through a global warming crisis. These are the ones who can pay for the lobbies and publicity people to get the scientifically ignorant to believe one of the other four.
It's like playing whack-a-mole.
Very few moles can afford their own police forces and can buy up armies of people to appear on TV as experts. The level of intimidation of climate scientists that goes on is amazing.
Re:Different thing (Score:5, Informative)
Um, Muller was one of the main people who supported McKitrick and McIntyre's paper against the "Hockey Stick Graph". Before that, he was a big backer of Soon and Baliunas's denialist work.
What we're seeing here is a lovely bit of revisionist history. *Most* of the denialist scientists accept at least some tenets of global warming, so you can dig up old quotes for almost any of them. But it's simply a fact that Muller was one of the leading critics of the "Hockey Stick Graph", and now he's gone and published a graph that confirms the Hockey Stick.
Re:Not news (Score:5, Informative)
Her comments, in an exclusive interview with The Mail on Sunday, seem certain to ignite a furious academic row. She said this affair had to be compared to the notorious âClimategateâ(TM) scandal two years ago.
The Mail on Sundays CLAIMS she said that. Prof Curry herself says that she was misquoted and misrepresented by the Mail On Sunday on this and several other things.
http://judithcurry.com/2011/10/30/mail-on-best/#more-5526 [judithcurry.com]
For those not from the UK: The Mail on Sunday, and it's Sister paper The Daily Mail are are pretty much the Fox News of British journalism.
Re:Different thing (Score:5, Informative)
He was skeptical of the science being claimed to prove the issue, not the issue itself. The two are very separate things - it's possible to say "Yeah, I think global warming is happening, but I don't believe the science being done thus far is of decent enough quality to prove it so we can't say for sure".
He has now done research that appears to fit quite closely to the science he was skeptical of.
Why do the global warming denialists need to make things up and jump to false conclusions if their belief is as solid as they say it is?
Nothing will help someone like you though, you're clearly set in your ways and not one of those people who will ever change their mind despite being faced with mounting evidence contrary to your claim, and no evidence supporting your claim. So stick to the straw man arguments, if they really make you feel better. I'm sure that's what flat earth theorists did to make themselves feel better too.
Re:I wonder (Score:5, Informative)
Indeed, what about Prof Curry herself. She blogged about that particular Daily Mail article and the fact that it misquoted and misrepresented her.
http://judithcurry.com/2011/10/30/mail-on-best/#more-5526 [judithcurry.com] [judithcurry.com]
In a nutshell she is in full support of the report. She just had a problem with some of the things Muller said about the report. Ergo: She accepts global warming is happening, and she's not claiming that global warming stopped over the last 10 years.
Re:Different thing (Score:4, Informative)
Um, hello -- Muller's backing of Soon and Balinuas? And there's lots of others, too. He's stuck up for denier papers pretty consistently.
Re:Different thing (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Different thing (Score:4, Informative)
CO2 is only a greenhouse gas (in that it has a higher heat capacity than the average of the remaining atmospheric components
That is not even remotely what defines a greenhouse gas. No wonder you are confused. A greenhouse gas is opaque to infrared light. it has nothing to do with heat capacity.