Surveys of Scientists

[Stephen Wilde]

Sunsettommy,
You may believe the "atmosphere is undeniably cooling for the past 7 years", but you need to define some kind of statistical calculation to define cooling, in scientific, mathematical terms, considering the year to year fluctuations in the data, in order to determine whether your statement has any truth or meaning.

Methinks 'cooling' over recent years is as well substantiated as the earlier 'warming'.

The definition of both as regards scientific, mathematical terms is equally lacking given the deficiencies of our sensors and methods.

There was clearly some warming and now some cooling but the assessment of the amount of each is highly debatable. Use of words such as 'unprecedented' has never been justified.

Causation is wide open and hardly 'settled'.

[questioner]

I discussed some of this with Paul Hardacre Chief Exec.of the RMetS in Liverpool recently and he pointed out that with a neutral ENSO such as the one we have had for some months now (the La Nina faded a while back) the warming trend attributable to CO2 (if any) should have been re establishing itself by now.

I agreed and mentioned that if we get a cold N Hemisphere winter despite a neutral ENSO signal then clearly something other than CO2 and ENSO is in play. My best guess is the quiet solar activity.

Global temperature changes are clearly fastest whether up or down when solar and oceanic cycles are in phase. When they are not in phase the relationship of cause and effect is unclear with present technology. CO2 comes nowhere in any of this for reasons set out extensively in my articles on this site.

Having made that simple observation the proper approach is to try and find out why it is so and that involves searching for the (currently unclear) solar forcing mechanism. I have suggested that it is a sensitivity issue with the Earth's oceans being highly sensitive to small solar changes especially if they continue cumulatively over several decades.

Leif Svalgaard is a highly respected solar scientist who is very dubious about ANY solar forcing. However even he is prepared to 'live with' the suggestion that solar changes might contribute up to 10% of observed global temperature changes. I pointed out to him that oceanic oscillations would only need to amplify solar effects fivefold ( five up and five down) for a 10 to 1 ratio to account for all observed 20th Century warming. His subsequent silence was deafening.

Frankly I think I've got the diagnosis right but it will take some time for the planet to confirm or rebut that.

I don't understand your remark about the [b]amplification[b] of solar effects by oscillations. Amplification would mean that when the sun's intensity increases or decreases the atmospheric temperature, the ocean by some process enhances this increase or decrease. My understanding of the ocean is that over time, it is absorbs solar radiation, reducing the warming effect of the sun, when solar power is up, and because it has so much heat stored, can keep the atmosphere warmer when the sun's power is reduced. It is the large heat capacity of the oceans which delays the warming of the earth due to the greenhouse effect. The ocean also reduces the daily oscillations in atmospheric temperature in a daily cycle as night follows day.
So the ocean naturally reduces the temperature swing in the earth's atmosphere.

There are oscillations in ocean currents that alternatively bring colder and warmer water to the surface. Do you have any data indicating that they are synchronized in some way with the sun's cycles? It certainly doesn't seem that way to me, but I may have missed something.

It would seem to me that the effects of ocean currents, solar variation, greenhouse gases, aerosals, and albedo are additive in some way, and that the way to figure all this out is to continue work on improved models. Simply picking driving forces based on personal bias to explain what is happening doesn't seem very scientific to me.

[questioner]

Sunsettommy,
You may believe the "atmosphere is undeniably cooling for the past 7 years", but you need to define some kind of statistical calculation to define cooling, in scientific, mathematical terms, considering the year to year fluctuations in the data, in order to determine whether your statement has any truth or meaning.

Methinks 'cooling' over recent years is as well substantiated as the earlier 'warming'.

The definition of both as regards scientific, mathematical terms is equally lacking given the deficiencies of our sensors and methods.

There was clearly some warming and now some cooling but the assessment of the amount of each is highly debatable. Use of words such as 'unprecedented' has never been justified.

Causation is wide open and hardly 'settled'.

I don't think you understood my question. It had nothing to do with causation, only data analysis.
How do you determine whether there is a cooling trend in a sequence of data over a given time period, and how do you calculate the level of confidence that there has been a real cooling trend?

What is the statistical basis for your statement in bold, given that it is your personal opinion.

[Stephen Wilde]

http://icecap.us/images/uploads/MSUCRUCO2.jpg

Or do you wish to cherry pick and simply assert that the earlier warming trend is somehow 'more valid' for statistical reasons ?

[questioner]

http://icecap.us/images/uploads/MSUCRUCO2.jpg

Or do you wish to cherry pick and simply assert that the earlier warming trend is somehow 'more valid' for statistical reasons ?

I am merely asking what is the slope and associated confidence interval?

[Stephen Wilde]

Does it matter ?

Up is up and down is down.

What matters is how long each phase lasts.

Slopes and confidence intervals have no value in our current state of ignorance.

[questioner]

Does it matter ?

Up is up and down is down.

What matters is how long each phase lasts.

Slopes and confidence intervals have no value in our current state of ignorance.

A scientist, uses the confidence interval to determine the validity of the statement that it has been getting cooler. So the answer to a scientist is yes it does matter a lot. If the confidence interval for the calculation of the slope includes zero, one can't determine that the observed cooling was a result of a trend, since it could be simply a matter of chance due to scatter in the data which would have no lasting significance.

For a scientist, the confidence interval is fundamental to the analysis of data. Your claim that there is no value in it, indicates that you lack an understanding of what it is that scientists do, and how they think, or that you want to avoid the issue, because it undermines your position.

[Stephen Wilde]

Not so.

The world goes it's own way and as yet we know not why.

In that situation a confidence analysis is a mere academic indulgence with no practical value.

When we know more (a lot more) then such analyses might have some value.

I'm afraid you demonstrate the primary problem with current climatology. An obsession with process instead of substance.

All those climatologists have career and grant driven obsessions with competing narrow specialisms and none of them know enough about the big picture to put their own bits of knowledge in a global perspective.

That is why the current climate debate has been abandoned by all those grant supported professionals and it is now only the independent (minded and financial) generalists who have any useful contribution to make.

It was warming, it is now cooling, we have no real idea why it did either.

[questioner]

Not so.

The world goes it's own way and as yet we know not why.

In that situation a confidence analysis is a mere academic indulgence with no practical value.

When we know more (a lot more) then such analyses might have some value.

I'm afraid you demonstrate the primary problem with current climatology. An obsession with process instead of substance.

All those climatologists have career and grant driven obsessions with competing narrow specialisms and none of them know enough about the big picture to put their own bits of knowledge in a global perspective.

That is why the current climate debate has been abandoned by all those grant supported professionals and it is now only the independent (minded and financial) generalists who have any useful contribution to make.

It was warming, it is now cooling, we have no real idea why it did either.

It seems to me you that you are denigrating the hard work that scientists do, and would like to substitute your personal opinion and idle speculation about climate, in place of the knowledge that they develop. It takes a trained scientist to understand the work of the specialists and put it in perspective and develop a model for how the the climate works. You do not say who the independent minded and financially independent generalists are, but I think a good word to describe them is dabblers.

[Stephen Wilde]

You yourself have said that a tone of denigration in a post (such as you now display) indicates that the poster has lost the argument.

Of course, if all those wonderful scientists ever actually manage to predict a change in trend then I would be happy to take them seriously.

In return I should be taken seriously having predicted the recent changes in trend both as regards global temperature and Arctic ice and having put forward plausible mechanisms.

It is now for the planet to diverge from the expectations raised by my theories and if it does then I will acknowledge that.

What would be your position if the planet continues to do as I expect ?

Enough said.