Rushing to Judgment (Global Warming Questioned - Long but Good)

Wilson Quarterly ^ | Autumn 2003 | Jack M. Hollander

[ancient_geezer]

All of the above are hyperlinked, but none of the links work. Would you mind getting me the titles and full author lists of these paper so I can look them up?

Complete working hyperlinks to paper summaries for the cites are on the source webpage:

-->CO2-Temperature Correlations

Apparently the authors of the website have reorganized it's structure somewhat. I'll see what I can do to update links. Thank you for alerting me to the changes.

Here are is the reference listing from that webpage for full titles

References
Cheddadi, R., Lamb, H.F., Guiot, J. and van der Kaars, S.  1998.  Holocene climatic change in Morocco: a quantitative reconstruction from pollen data.  Climate Dynamics 14: 883-890.

Clark, P.U. and Mix, A.C.  2000.  Ice sheets by volume.  Nature 406: 689-690.

Fischer, H., Wahlen, M., Smith, J., Mastroianni, D. and Deck, B.  1999.  Ice core records of atmospheric CO2 around the last three glacial terminations.  Science 283: 1712-1714.

Gagan, M.K., Ayliffe, L.K., Hopley, D., Cali, J.A., Mortimer, G.E., Chappell, J., McCulloch, M.T. and Head, M.J.  1998.  Temperature and surface-ocean water balance of the mid-Holocene tropical western Pacific.  Science 279: 1014-1017.

Indermuhle, A., Monnin, E., Stauffer, B. and Stocker, T.F.  2000.  Atmospheric CO2 concentration from 60 to 20 kyr BP from the Taylor Dome ice core, Antarctica.  Geophysical Research Letters 27: 735-738.

Indermuhle, A., Stocker, T.F., Joos, F., Fischer, H., Smith, H.J., Wahllen, M., Deck, B., Mastroianni, D., Tschumi, J., Blunier, T., Meyer, R. and Stauffer, B.  1999.  Holocene carbon-cycle dynamics based on CO2 trapped in ice at Taylor Dome, Antarctica.  Nature 398: 121-126.

Mann, M.E., Bradley, R.S. and Hughes, M.K. 1999. Northern Hemisphere temperatures during the past millennium: Inferences, uncertainties, and limitations.  Geophysical Research Letters 26: 759-762.

Monnin, E., Indermühle, A., Dällenbach, A., Flückiger, J, Stauffer, B., Stocker, T.F., Raynaud, D. and Barnola, J.-M.  2001.  Atmospheric CO2 concentrations over the last glacial termination.  Nature 291: 112-114.

Mudelsee, M.  2001.  The phase relations among atmospheric CO2 content, temperature and global ice volume over the past 420 ka.  Quaternary Science Reviews 20: 583-589.

Pagani, M., Authur, M.A. and Freeman, K.H.  1999.  Miocene evolution of atmospheric carbon dioxide.  Paleoceanography 14: 273-292.

Pearson, P.N. and Palmer, M.R.  1999.  Middle Eocene seawater pH and atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations.  Science 284: 1824-1826.

Pearson, P.N. and Palmer, M.R.  2000.  Atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations over the past 60 million years.  Nature 406: 695-699.

Petit, J.R., Jouzel, J., Raynaud, D., Barkov, N.I., Barnola, J.-M., Basile, I., Bender, M., Chappellaz, J., Davis, M., Delaygue, G., Delmotte, M., Kotlyakov, V.M., Legrand, M., Lipenkov, V.Y., Lorius, C., Pepin, L., Ritz, C., Saltzman, E. and Stievenard, M.  1999.  Climate and atmospheric history of the past 420,000 years from the Vostok ice core, Antarctica.  Nature 399: 429-436.

Raymo, M.E., Ganley, K., Carter, S., Oppo, D.W. and McManus, J.  1998.  Millennial-scale climate instability during the early Pleistocene epoch.  Nature 392: 699-702.

Staufer, B., Blunier, T., Dallenbach, A., Indermuhle, A., Schwander, J., Stocker, T.F., Tschumi, J., Chappellaz, J., Raynaud, D., Hammer, C.U. and Clausen, H.B.  1998.  Atmospheric CO2 concentration and millennial-scale climate change during the last glacial period.  Nature 392: 59-62.

Steig, E.J.  1999.  Mid-Holocene climate change.  Science 286: 1485-1487.

Yokoyama, Y., Lambeck, K., Deckker, P.D., Johnston, P. and Fifield, L.K.  2000.  Timing of the Last Glacial Maximum from observed sea-level minima.  Nature 406: 713-716.

[kidd]

I was referring to the OISM hoax survey in this case.

If you are referring to the Petition Project, then it is neither a hoax nor a survey.

Human induced global warming works well as a scare-mongering technique in the media and in politics, however, as the Petition Project demonstrated, human induced global warming is simply not a well accepted scientific concept.

[ancient_geezer]

Yes CO2 does vary in response to interglacial warmings, variation in solar irradiation of the earth's surface, and other climate factors as is obvious from the charts.

Strange how that happens when the biomass changes in response to climate factors isn't it?

The issue is not the variation of CO2 concentration. The negligible effect of CO2 concentrations on temperature leave CO2 changes to be of only academic interest as regards climate change.

[ancient_geezer]

Yes CO2 does vary in response to interglacial warmings, variation in solar irradiation of the earth's surface, and other climate factors as is obvious from the charts.

Strange how that happens when the biomass changes in response to climate factors isn't it?

The issue is not the variation of CO2 concentration. The negligible effect of CO2 concentrations on temperature leave CO2 changes to be of only academic interest as regards climate change.

[cogitator]

the Petition Project demonstrated, human induced global warming is simply not a well accepted scientific concept.

The Petition Project was based on a hoax. The paper accompanying the mailing was made to look like a PNAS paper, when in fact it was not a peer-reviewed paper at all, but rather a private publication.

In fact, the NAS had to publically distance themselves from the hoax.

That's all. It's irrelevant to the discussion at hand.

[cogitator]

I posted the plots primarily to display figure (b), but eventually I'd like to discuss the correlated variation of CO2 and temperature in the Vostok ice core with you -- if you're willing.

Yes CO2 does vary in response to interglacial warmings, variation in solar irradiation of the earth's surface, and other climate factors as is obvious from the charts.

That has never been in dispute.

The negligible effect of CO2 concentrations on temperature leave CO2 changes to be of only academic interest as regards climate change.

Then why did Dr. Berner say:
"Over Phanerozoic time a major control on global climate has been the CO2 greenhouse effect, and changes in CO2 have been a consequence of a combination of geological, biological, and astronomical factors," hmmm?

And why does Dr. Lee Kump of Pennsylvania State University say:

"There are good reasons to suspect that atmospheric pCO2 (the partial pressure of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere) has been a primary climate driver in the geologic past. Numerical carbon cycle models and atmospheric pCO2 proxies generally support the suspected relationship between climate and atmospheric pCO2. Moreover, there are good correlations among CO2, paleotemperature, and orbital forcing factors on glacial-interglacial timescales of the last 400,000 years, indicating an important role for CO2 in the climatic response to changes in solar energy input."

Why do these esteemed geological scientists say that atmospheric CO2 concentrations are a major factor (a "control" or "driver") on global climate if CO2 concentrations have a negligible effect on temperature? Is there some other way that atmospheric CO2 concentrations would significantly affect global climate, AG?

[kidd]

The paper was prepared in a technical paper format. It was not necessarily a PNAS format. I have prepared several papers for EPRI sponsored symposiums using that same format. Both the author and the intended audience are technical people and thus it was appropriate to prepare it as such. It was a well referenced paper that was well written. The authors did not purposely try to deceive the readers.

Are you trying to imply that the 17,000+ scientists and engineers who signed the Petition took one look at the format and said to themselves - "Gee, this looks really official - I'd better sign it!"???

That's absurd.

[ancient_geezer]

While you were at it you should have shown us the UN/IPCC pretended projections of what happens under a mere 2x change in CO2 concentration, (in comparison to the 21x change in CO2 concentration of geophysical record that could only move global surface temperatures 1 degree C)

From your UNEP (United Nations Environmental Programme) site:

21. Using the IS92 emission scenarios, projected global mean temperature changes relative to 1990 were calculated up to 2100. Climate models calculate that the global mean surface temperature could rise by about 1 to 4.5 centigrade by 2100. The topmost curve is for IS92e, assuming constant aerosol concentrations beyond 1990 and high climate sensitivity of 4.5 °C. The lowest curve is for IS92c and assumes constant aerosol concentrations beyond 1990 and a low climate sensitivity of 1.5 °C. The two middle curves show the results for IS92a with "best estimate" of climate sensitivity of 2.5 °C: the upper curve assumes a constant aerosol concentration beyond 1990, and the lower one includes changes in aerosol concentration beyond 1990. (It is assumed that the Greenhouse effect is reduced with increased aerosols.)

Note: In IPCC reports, climate sensitivity usually refers to the long- term or equilibrium, change in global mean surface temperature following a doubling of CO₂-equivalent atmospheric concentrations. More generally, it refers to the equilibrium change in surface air temperature following a unit change in radiative forcing (°C/Wm-2)

[cogitator]

It was not necessarily a PNAS format.

Yes it was.

Oh fergoshsakes, read what the NAS said about it.

STATEMENT BY THE COUNCIL OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES REGARDING GLOBAL CHANGE PETITION

April 20, 1998

The Council of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS; http://www2.nas.edu/nas/) is concerned about the confusion caused by a petition being circulated via a letter from a former president of this Academy. This petition criticizes the science underlying the Kyoto treaty on carbon dioxide emissions (the Kyoto Protocol to the Framework Convention on Climate Change), and it asks scientists to recommend rejection of this treaty by the U.S. Senate. The petition was mailed with an op- ed article from The Wall Street Journal and a manuscript in a format that is nearly identical to that of scientific articles published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (http://www.pnas.org/nas/). The NAS Council would like to make it clear that this petition has nothing to do with the National Academy of Sciences and that the manuscript was not published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences or in any other peer-reviewed journal.

The petition does not reflect the conclusions of expert reports of the Academy.

In particular, the Committee on Science, Engineering, and Public Policy (http://www2.nas.edu/cosepup/) of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering (NAE), and the Institute of Medicine (IOM) conducted a major consensus study on this issue, entitled Policy Implications of Greenhouse Warming (1991,1992; see http://www2.nas.edu/climate-change/). This analysis concluded that " ...even given the considerable uncertainties in our knowledge of the relevant phenomena, greenhouse warming poses a potential threat sufficient to merit prompt responses. ... Investment in mitigation measures acts as insurance protection against the great uncertainties and the possibility of dramatic surprises." In addition, the Committee on Global Change Research of the National Research Council, the operating arm of the NAS and the NAE, will issue a major report later this spring on the research issues that can help to reduce the scientific uncertainties associated with global change phenomena, including climate change.

If it didn't look enough like a PNAS article to cause confusion, why would the NAS council publish a statement worded like this?

[cogitator]

We'll get to predictions in due time. Is it so much to ask for you to concentrate on one or two points at a time? You seem to specialize in the pizza toss form of debate -- toss a pizza at your opponent and see what sticks.

Point one: atmospheric CO2 concentration increase since the mid-1800s is due to fossil fuel burning and land-use changes.

Point two: prominent geochemists indicate that atmospheric CO2 concentrations are a significant controlling or driving factor for global climate change over Phanerozoic time. This point indicates that the CO2 effect on global temperatures is significant, rather than negligible.

Are we in agreement on point one, or do you wish to continue discussion of it? Are we in agreement on point two, or do you wish to continue discussion of it? I would like agreement on point one and continued discussion of point two -- we have yet to evaluate what Berner and Kump say about the Ordovician glaciation and the Miocene warm period.

[ancient_geezer]

Then why did Dr. Berner say:
"Over Phanerozoic time a major control on global climate has been the CO2 greenhouse effect, and changes in CO2 have been a consequence of a combination of geological, biological, and astronomical factors," hmmm?

Where did those changes have to come from? "a consequence of a combination of geological, biological, and astronomical factors"

What was the actual change in concentration?

21x change in CO2 concentration. from 7000ppmv to 320 ppmv

What was the change in temperature that can be correlated with that CO2 change after removing the effect of the primary initiators of change?

1 degree C.

The issue is clear that CO2 not a major "driver" as shown clearly in reviewing the data and the statement of Brenner.

Note a driver = cause, change in CO2 concentration is "a consequence of a combination of geological, biological, and astronomical factors"

Remove the effects of gamma ray bursts, meteoric, plate tecktoniks on cloud and ice cover in affecting the albedo(reflectivity of the Earth), what is left over is the correlation of 1 degree C with a 21x change in CO2.

Why do these esteemed geological scientists say that atmospheric CO2 concentrations are a major factor (a "control" or "driver") on global climate if CO2 concentrations have a negligible effect on temperature?

They quite simply overstate the role of CO2, as we both know scientist's of just as great a standing say the opposite with the data and physics clearly supporting the lesser role of CO2 in view of the much greater role clouds, ice & water vapor play in controlling the climate.

Mankind's impact is only 0.28% of Total Greenhouse effect

" There is no dispute at all about the fact that even if punctiliously observed, (the Kyoto Protocol) would have an imperceptible effect on future temperatures -- one-twentieth of a degree by 2050. "

Dr. S. Fred Singer, atmospheric physicist
Professor Emeritus of Environmental Sciences at the University of Virginia,
and former director of the US Weather Satellite Service;
in a Sept. 10, 2001 Letter to Editor, Wall Street Journal

Is there some other way that atmospheric CO2 concentrations would significantly affect global climate, AG?

I'm sure you will tell us if there is, we'll check on it for your :O)

[kidd]

Oh fergoshsakes. It is not a PNAS format. The NAS does not have a copyright to a two column format. To me - this looks like an EPRI format! Or an ASME format! Or an AWS format! Or a CEP format! I reviewed everything I've submitted for publication - they "look" like a PNAS format.

If you want to get into details, the Robinson article doesn't meet the exact PNAS formatting requirements - they use different fonts, the date of the article appears in the wrong place, etc.

The article contained no suggestion at all that it was associated with the NAS. There are no PNAS headings or footers.

So why would the NAS complain about the format??!? That's easy - its a cheap shot at discrediting the project. Typical liberal trick - if you can't beat them on substance - make fun of how they look. Liberals still call Rush Limbaugh fat because they can't counter his arguments, and the NAS makes a stink about format because they can't counter the content of the article.

Let me ask you some questions:

1. Exactly WHO was confused that this might be a PNAS article?

2. Do you seriously believe that there was even ONE engineer or scientist who took one look at the article and thought to himself - "Gee, this looks official, like its from the PNAS - I better sign that petition!" ???

[ancient_geezer]

Are we in agreement on point one,

It is irrelevant.

or do you wish to continue discussion of it?

Nothing gained by it.

Point two: prominent geochemists indicate that atmospheric CO2 concentrations are a significant controlling or driving factor for global climate change over Phanerozoic time. This point indicates that the CO2 effect on global temperatures is significant, rather than negligible.

The data and atmospheric scientists make clear water vapor is by far the most dominant by a factor of greater than 25 to 1.

The data shows a 21x change in CO2 for only a residual 1 degree change in global temperature. I call that negligible in relation to the effect that water in vapor, ice & cloud forms have upon the climate.

If you want to call CO2 "significant", that's your choice. That however leaves only a 0.27^oC change associated with doubling of CO2 concentration, however it may come about.

Neither the physics nor the data support the UN/IPCC and their modeller's catastophic scenarios.

Climate Catastrophe, A spectroscopic Artifact?

"It is hardly to be expected that for CO2 doubling an increment of IR absorption at the 15 µm edges by 0.17% can cause any significant global warming or even a climate catastrophe.

The radiative forcing for doubling can be calculated by using this figure. If we allocate an absorption of 32 W/m² [14] over 180º steradiant to the total integral (area) of the n3 band as observed from satellite measurements (Hanel et al., 1971) and applied to a standard atmosphere, and take an increment of 0.17%, the absorption is 0.054 W/m² - and not 4.3 W/m².

This is roughly 80 times less than IPCC's radiative forcing.

If we allocate 7.2 degC as greenhouse effect for the present CO2 (as asserted by Kondratjew and Moskalenko in J.T. Houghton's book The Global Climate [14]), the doubling effect should be 0.17% which is 0.012 degC only. If we take 1/80 of the 1.2 degC that result from Stefan-Boltzmann's law with a radiative forcing of 4.3 W/m², we get a similar value of 0.015 degC."

A Lukewarm Greenhouse
"The average warming predicted by the six methods for a doubling of CO2, is only +0.2 degC."

 

we have yet to evaluate what Berner and Kump say about the Ordovician glaciation and the Miocene warm period.

As well as many other's to be sure.

[gatex]

"If it didn't look enough like a PNAS article to cause confusion, why would the NAS council publish a statement worded like this?"

Please explain why this makes the petition a "hoax".

Could be propaganda to get people to ignore the petition.

[gatex]

"Point one: atmospheric CO2 concentration increase since the mid-1800s is due to fossil fuel burning and land-use changes. "

What caused the 304 ppmv concentrations 340,000 years ago (Vostok ice ) ?

[cogitator]

The fact that the article was accompanied by a letter by Frederick Seitz, past president of NAS, and looked like a PNAS article was the cited cause of the possible confusion.

As for who might or might not have been confused, I don't know how many gullible people may have been influenced. The issue is whether or not the article looked like a peer-reviewed paper published in PNAS. The NAS was concerned enough that this confusion could arise that they issued a statement of clarification.

[cogitator]

One followup: I went back and read the NAS statement. They did two things; one, they clarified that the paper was not published in PNAS, and two, they also stated that the opinions circulated with the petition did not reflect the views expressed in NAS expert reports. The latter point is also important; because the paper came with a letter written by Frederick Seitz (and he did indicate that he was a past president of NAS), it could be concluded without much thought that he was providing a NAS publication.

Also noted in passing; according to information found on the Web, OISM only required that the signers of the petition have a bachelor's degree in any science. That apparently included a lot of medical professionals.

[kidd]

...I don't know how many gullible people may have been influenced...

Be honest. The letter was mailed out to 19,000 people. 19,000 people with a technical background. People who went to college and had to understand math, maybe physics, maybe chemistry, maybe biology. Intelligent people. What you are implying is a kind of mass hysteria - that thousands and thousands of technically minded people simply looked at the name "Frederick Seitz" and how the article appeared, recognized that format as a PNAS format (not just a technical paper format), and without reading its contents, signed the petition simply out of respect for the National Academy of Sciences.

The issue is that human induced global warming is not accepted as scientific fact. The Petition Project simply documents that there is no concensus on human induced global warming.

[cogitator]

What caused the 304 ppmv concentrations 340,000 years ago (Vostok ice )?

Warmer global temperatures, obviously; same reason for the 280 ppmv concentrations at about 240K and 130K BP.

Time for my question in response. See where the red line is at the far right side of the graph? Notice anything unusual about that?

[kidd]

OISM only required that the signers of the petition have a bachelor's degree in any science.

Two-thirds of the signers have advanced degrees. The paper was written so that those with bachelor's degrees would be able to comprehend the data. About 2600 of the signers have degrees that are directly related to atmospheric science.

The Petition Project is valid documentation in the scientific community that there is not a concensus on human induced global warming.