Climate Science 2

“Julie, I’ve found it helpful to keep a list of dates of some of the more important events in climate science.  With that, I know who knew what when.  Shall we share the list with our readers?”

“Curmudge, at your age I can understand your need for the list.  By all means, let’s share it.”

1000-1200 A.D.  Medieval Warm Period.

~1100  Vikings settled Greenland.

~1350  Greenland settlements died out.

1350-1900 A.D.  Little Ice Age.  We’re still recovering from the Little Ice Age.  In the 1940’s in Ohio one could ice skate outside all winter.  Senior citizens still say, “Winters aren’t like they used to be.”  

1990, 1995, 2001, 2007 – IPCC issued Assessment Reports on Global Warming. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intergovernmental_Panel_on_Climate_Change#Fifth_assessment_report

1997  Kyoto Protocol.  Established mandatory targets on greenhouse gas emissions for the world’s leading economies.

1998-1999  “The Hockey Stick.”  Plots of surface temperature that were relatively flat up to 1900 followed by a sharp increase.  This remains the subject of fierce debate.

April 2000  National Public Radio’s “What’s up with the weather?”  In-depth interviews with experts on both sides of the debate.  Text accessible at http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/warming/debate/

April 2009  U.S. E.P.A. Officially designated carbon dioxide as a pollutant.

2009-November 2011  “Climategate.”  Hacked emails released indicating that the Hockey Stick authors used questionable statistics and data manipulation and suppressed publication of research that contradicted their findings.  (See Kaizen Curmudgeon posting on Peer Review.)

April 12, 2013.  Røyrvik, Emil A.  Consensus and Controversy, The Debate on Man-Made Global Warming.  SINTEF A24071.

2013.  The NOAA “State of the Climate in 2008” report asserted that 15 years or more without any statistically significant warming would indicate a discrepancy between observation and prediction.  Sixteen years without warming have therefore now proven that the models are wrong by their creators’ own criterion.  (SINTEF A24071, p. 54)

“So, Julie, that’s the list that brings us close to the present.”

“I sense, Old Guy, that you are in the ‘contrarian’ camp on global warming, i.e., that you feel that increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will not cause global warming with attendant climatic disasters.”

“To be more specific, I don’t agree with those in the so-called ‘consensus’ camp that their ‘science’ has proven anthropogenic global warming.  At present, the issue is unresolved, and Mother Nature has no obligation to comply with the beliefs or consensus of a group of climate scientists.”

“Historically, Curmudge, this has been and continues to be a closely-fought debate.  What factors tipped you into the contrarian camp?”

“There were several, Julie.  a) The issue became political, and the scientists had a vested interest in their findings.  (See our recent posting on models and vested interest.)  b)  ‘Climategate’ destroyed the credibility of the principal global warming proponents.  c) For the past several years, global temperatures have not risen as they had been forecast.  d) Factors other than carbon dioxide have been found to correlate better with global temperature.”

“I’ll bet that many of the ‘factor d)’ findings were in the Robinson, Robinson, and Soon paper (1).  I also suspect that this review paper with 132 references might have been one of those suppressed during Climategate.”

“It might have been, Julie.  Here are some quotations from Robinson et al.  Citations to the original findings may be found in their paper.

‘Hydrocarbon use is uncorrelated with temperature.  Temperature rose for a century before significant hydrocarbon use.  Temperature rose between 1910 and 1940, while hydrocarbon use was almost unchanged.  Temperature then fell between 1940 and 1972, while hydrocarbon use rose by 330%.  Also, the 150 to 200-year slopes of the sea level and glacial trends were unchanged by the very large increase in hydrocarbon use after 1940.’

‘During the current period of recovery from the Little Ice Age (data from either 1900 or 1950 to 2006), the U.S. climate has improved somewhat, with more rainfall, fewer tornados, and no increase in hurricane activity.  Sea level has trended upward for the past 150 years at a rate of 7 inches per century.’

‘There is a close correlation between solar activity and temperature and none between hydrocarbon use and temperature.’  ‘The observed variation in solar activity is typical of stars close in size and age to the sun.  The current warming trends on Mars, Jupiter, Neptune, Neptune’s moon Triton, and Pluto may result, in part, from similar relations to the sun and its activity—like those that are warming the Earth.’

‘Correlation does not prove causality, but non-correlation proves non-causality.’ “

“Wow, Curmudge!  Those are pretty powerful findings.  Please move over and make room for me in the contrarian camp.  Nevertheless, despite your curmudgeonly prejudices, you promised an overview of the hopefully even-handed presentation in SINTEF A24071”

“Hang in there, Julie.  That will be our next posting.”

Kaizen Curmudgeon

(1)  Robinson, A.B., Robinson, N.E., and Soon, W.  Environmental Effects of Increased Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide, J. Am. Phys. Surg. 12, 79-90 (2007).

http://www.jpands.org/jpands1203.htm

Link to posting from blog archives: A Just Culture 11/28/08

http://kaizencurmudgeon.blogspot.com/2008/11/just-culture.html

Climate Science 1

“It was fun writing those allegories about global warming, Curmudge, but now I understand that you want to take a more scholarly look at climate science.  Like many other topics that we have discussed, you don’t know diddly about anything higher into the troposphere than the old man’s third-floor apartment.”

“I do so know diddly, Jaded Julie.  I can forecast the weather: ‘Red sky in the morning, sailors take warning.  Red sky at night, sailors’ delight.’  See?  But my real reason for tackling this topic is that too many people seem to accept the catastrophic global warming dogma without giving it much thought.  Here’s an example.  A local church is asking its governing body to ‘request that Congress enact legislation to fight climate change.’ “

“Part of that makes sense.  If climate change is due to natural phenomena (‘acts of God’), churches probably provide the best medium for making such a request.  The U.S. Congress is a totally inappropriate intermediary.”

Climatology 101

“How can we teach climate, Curmudge?  Neither of us has a degree in it.”

“Even if we did, Julie, it wouldn’t matter.  With the exception of a few professors and doctors, advanced degrees expire after 40 years.  We’ve been reading climate stuff for weeks, so we can ‘wing it.’  The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was created in 1988; and despite the alarmist tone of their assessment reports, they do contain some useful information.  We’ll quote excerpts from one of them (1) as our main resource for Climatology 101.  A more detailed discussion of climate fundamentals (not quoted) is provided by Somerville (2).”

“I knew you were kidding about ‘expire after 40 years,’ so put on your jacket with chalk dust on the sleeves.  Class is in session.”

‘The climate system evolves in time under the influence of its own internal dynamics and due to changes in external factors that affect climate (called ‘forcings’). External forcings include natural phenomena such as volcanic eruptions and solar variations, as well as human-induced changes in atmospheric composition. Solar radiation powers the climate system. There are three fundamental ways to change the radiation balance of the Earth: 1) by changing the incoming solar radiation (e.g., by changes in Earth’s orbit or in the Sun itself); 2) by changing the fraction of solar radiation that is reflected, e.g., by changes in cloud cover, atmospheric particles or vegetation); and 3) by altering the longwave radiation from Earth back towards space (e.g., by changing greenhouse gas concentrations). Climate, in turn, responds directly to such changes, as well as indirectly, through a variety of feedback mechanisms.’

‘About 30% of the sunlight that reaches the top of the atmosphere is reflected back to space. Roughly two-thirds of this reflectivity is due to clouds and small particles in the atmosphere known as ‘aerosols’. Light-colored areas of Earth’s surface – mainly snow, ice and deserts – reflect the remaining one-third of the sunlight.’

‘The reason the Earth’s surface is this warm is the presence of greenhouse gases, which act as a partial blanket for the longwave radiation coming from the surface. This blanketing is known as the natural greenhouse effect. The most important greenhouse gases are water vapor and carbon dioxide. The two most abundant constituents of the atmosphere – nitrogen and oxygen – have no such effect. Clouds, on the other hand, do exert a blanketing effect similar to that of the greenhouse gases; however, this effect is offset by their reflectivity, such that on average, clouds tend to have a cooling effect on climate.’

“Wow, Curmudge, we should be grateful for the natural greenhouse effect.  Without it the earth would be as cold as the moon, and uninhabitable.”

‘Energy is transported from the equatorial areas to higher latitudes via atmospheric and oceanic circulations, including storm systems. Energy is also required to evaporate water from the sea or land surface, and this energy, called latent heat, is released when water vapor condenses in clouds. Atmospheric circulation is primarily driven by the release of this latent heat. Atmospheric circulation in turn drives much of the ocean circulation through the action of winds on the surface waters of the ocean, and through changes in the ocean’s surface temperature and salinity through precipitation and evaporation. Changes in various aspects of the climate system, such as the size of ice sheets, the type and distribution of vegetation or the temperature of the atmosphere or ocean will influence the large-scale circulation features of the atmosphere and oceans.’

‘There are many feedback mechanisms in the climate system that can either amplify (‘positive feedback’) or diminish (‘negative feedback’) the effects of a change in climate forcing. For example, as (or if) rising concentrations of greenhouse gases warm Earth’s climate, snow and ice begin to melt. This melting reveals darker land and water surfaces that were beneath the snow and ice, and these darker surfaces absorb more of the Sun’s heat, causing more warming, which causes more melting, and so on, in a self-reinforcing cycle. Detecting, understanding and accurately quantifying climate feedbacks have been the focus of a great deal of research by scientists unraveling the complexities of Earth’s climate.’

“With that introduction, Curmudge, I’m now ready to read the original climatology literature.”

“We’d be reading forever, Julie, and fortunately it has been done for us.  We’ll be discussing review articles; our friends in health care call them meta-analyses.”

Kaizen Curmudgeon   

  

(1)  IPCC.  What Factors Determine Earth’s Climate? http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/faq-1-1.html

(2)  http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/warming/debate/somerville.html

Link to posting from blog archives: Clashing Cultures in Patient Safety: the "Blame Game" vs. the "Just Culture" 11/20/08 http://kaizencurmudgeon.blogspot.com/2008/11/clashing-cultures-in-patient-safety.html

600 Years Ago

In the 15^th century there were no computers.  Instead, they had wizards.  Although now we have computers, we still have wizards who tell us what the computer output means.  Return to the15th century with Curmudge and Jaded Julie who tell us about a wizard who might sound familiar.  The wizard, however, shall remain nameless.  (This allegory was conceived purely for the author’s amusement.)  

Reprinted from Curmudgeon’s Wastebasket Originally Posted February 17, 2010

“Today, Jaded Julie, we’re going to do some thinking outside of the box.”

“That shouldn’t be hard, Curmudge. You are outside of the box.”

“We’ll begin by making some assumptions for which there has been some evidence in recent years (1). Let’s assume that the earth’s average temperature has been rising linearly at 0.7 degrees Celsius per 100 years and that a total increase of four degrees C. converts the earth into a jungle. At 0.7 degrees per century, that would require 570 years. For simplicity, let’s round it off to 600 years and begin our story in the year 1410, i.e., 600 years ago.”

“I’m with you, Curmudge. Beam me down, Scottie.”

“Life was not easy in 1410. While the kings lived like kings, the common people in the country eked out a living in agriculture and those in the cities built cathedrals. Along came an all-knowing (so he thought) wizard who convinced the Pope and all the world’s kings, czars, and caliphs that we were faced with the future tragedy of global warming. (He was wrong. In 1410 we were actually at the end of the Medieval Warm Period.) Further, the wizard proposed that global warming could be averted by stopping the growth of the burning of fossil fuels, at that time coal and peat. The world’s leaders agreed with the wizard and decreed that his proposal be implemented.  Additionally, the people were so grateful for the wizard’s insight that he became quite famous and was showered with riches.”

“I think I see what’s coming, Curmudge. The growth of a civilization parallels its energy use. If additional coal could not be mined, the development of civilization would have been arrested at 1410. I shudder at the thought; it would have been ‘Groundhog Day’ forever.”

”Worse than that, Julie. Without coal for steam engines, the Industrial Revolution could not have occurred, and our life expectancy would still be around 40 years. Even the printing press might not have been invented. In fact, most of the inventions created after 1410 would not have happened.”

“Things like cars, airplanes, computers, modern sanitation and health care, nuclear power, space flight, and Krispy Kreme donuts.  So Curmudge, is there a lesson in this?”

“Sure. World leaders should be wary of purported wizards; and if they do believe the wizard, they should not be taken in by recommendations of global, draconian measures.”

“By the way, Curmudge, now we know that the wizard was wrong and that he had pulled off the 15^th century’s biggest boondoggle.  What eventually happened to him?”

“I took awhile for the world leaders to realize that they had been ‘had.’   By then the wizard had disappeared with his bag of gold and presumably lived happily ever after.”

Kaizen Curmudgeon

(1) Plass, G.N. Carbon dioxide and the climate. Reprint of author’s 1956 article in American Scientist 98 (1) 58-67 (January-February 2010)

http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/feature/2010/1/carbon-dioxide-and-the-climate/1

Link to posting from blog archives: Resources for Learning About Patient Safety: 11/13/08

http://kaizencurmudgeon.blogspot.com/2008/11/resources-for-learning-about-patient.html

Peer-Reviewed Publications

In this reprint, Curmudge and Jaded Julie discuss the traditional practice of conceiving, writing, and publishing a peer-reviewed scientific paper. It was revealed in November of 2009 that some climate science researchers had violated aspects of this long-accepted practice.  These events were given the name “climategate.” To a published scientist, climategate was abhorrent.  In the view of Kaizen Curmudgeon, the perpetrators of climategate should no longer participate in the global warming debate.

 

Reprinted from Curmudgeon’s Wastebasket Originally Posted February 10, 2010

“Curmudge, the term ‘peer-reviewed’ has been in the news a lot during the past few months. This might be one of those extremely rare blog topics about which you know something. Would you be so kind as to enlighten me, or is this a subject—like differential equations—that you have totally forgotten?”

“I would be delighted to share my recollections, Jaded Julie. Because I had manuscripts peer reviewed between 1961 and 2002 and did a bit of reviewing myself, much of it has become hardwired.”

“Please give it a try, Old Guy. Let’s start by looking at the process from the author’s standpoint and how he or she decides what is publishable.”

“The critical guideline in this whole process, Julie, is integrity. If data from an experiment or series of experiments provides the basis for a finding or story heretofore unknown to the world or to others in your discipline, it is a candidate for publication. But one can’t cherry-pick his data. If some of the data don’t fit your story, they can’t simply be ignored; they can only be rejected if they are statistical outliers.”

“I can appreciate the importance of integrity. Doesn’t everyone have some element of vested interest in his research?”

“Vested interest comes in many flavors, Julie. Late in one’s career, the author’s delight in contributing to knowledge would represent the low end of the vested interest scale. At the far end of the scale is current work in atmospheric science. It seems that in that discipline one’s findings impact multimillion-dollar technological ventures, politics, and the fate of the industrialized world. The higher one goes on the vested interest scale, the greater the temptation to compromise one’s integrity.”

“So back to the guy in the lab. The author writes his paper, including data to support his hypothesis (remember, no fudging or cherry-picking) and enough experimental detail to permit someone to duplicate the work, and sends it off to a journal for publication, right?”

“Exactly. Often he must wait many months—up to a year—for the peer review process to transpire.”

“Am I correct, Curmudge, that publication in a peer-reviewed journal has traditionally been the ‘gold standard’ for scientific knowledge?”

“You are essentially correct, Jaded Julie. Remember, however, that the ultimate tests are (1) one’s work must be independently reproducible by someone else, and (2) any forecasts must turn out to be true. Nevertheless, despite all of its warts and blemishes and potential for hanky-panky, the peer review process has worked pretty well. Because my area was not highly controversial and was populated by a limited number of scientists, peer review was not very onerous for either authors or reviewers.”

“Curmudge, what’s that ‘potential for hanky-panky’ that you mentioned earlier?”

“Here’s an example. Consider a topic about which there are two schools of thought and in which editors and reviewers have a vested interest. Remember that peer review is a single-blind process in which the reviewers know the author but not vice-versa.”

“I think I can see what’s coming, Curmudge. If the editor’s position on the topic is ’A’ and the author is advocating position ‘B’, the editor can reject the paper out of hand or send it to reviewers that share position ‘A’ who will recommend rejection. I feel sorry for the poor author. He’s been shot down, but he doesn’t know by whom. And potential reviewers who are interested in position ‘B’ may wonder why they never receive any manuscripts to review. ”

“That’s it, Julie. If the author can’t find another journal whose reviewers will at least consider evidence of position ‘B’, he and position ‘B’ are effectively suppressed. This would appear to be ‘political’ science, i.e., science for the purpose of politics or vested interests. My speculation is that this might represent the untimely and unjustified demise of traditional peer review.”

“So how do we summarize the lessons of these last four postings?”

“It’s pretty simple, Julie. Be wary of politicians talking about science, of people confusing effect with cause, of scientists with a vested interest using complex mathematical models that can’t be experimentally verified, and of researchers who suppress publication of findings that don’t agree with their own.”

Kaizen Curmudgeon

Link to posting from blog archives: Reliability and Patient Safety: 11/06/08

http://kaizencurmudgeon.blogspot.com/2008/11/reliability-and-patient-safety.html

Curmudge and Jaded Julie Talk About Models and Vested Interest

Computer models purported to forecast the temperature of the earth have been the source of recent claims of anthropogenic (man-made) global warming.  Substantial wealth has accrued to the alarmist messengers of the resulting worldwide chaos.  This wealth was attained either directly from presentations, a film and investments, or indirectly from grants for continuing research.  Thus these people have a vested interest in the outputs from the models.  In the reprint below, Curmudge and Jaded Julie discuss models and vested interests using a simple example.

        

Reprinted from Curmudgeon’s Wastebasket Originally Posted February 3, 2010

“Models, Curmudge? You mean those super-slender gals who look as if they have an eating disorder?”

“No, Jaded Julie. We’re going to talk about mathematical models; these are mathematical depictions of processes. Models were described in our discussions of queuing theory last July. Authors that we cited in Kaizen Curmudgeon a few weeks ago used models to forecast physician income in a medical home. We use value stream maps all the time as visual models to depict processes in the hospital. The equations that I learned in physics classes long ago were models of physical processes; they included statics (e.g., forces on a stationary beam), and dynamics (a ball rolling down an inclined plane).”

“Wow! There must be a model for everything. I’ll bet that the advent of the computer has made it possible to model processes that are more and more complex.”

“That’s for sure. We’ll talk more about that later, but let’s start by considering a very simple example. Our daughter moved to a new house in Madison, so I consulted MapSeek* to learn how to get there. In addition to directions, MapSeek said that our daughter’s house is 104.61 miles from ours and that it would take us 1 hour and 54 minutes to get there. In computing our travel time, MapSeek must have used the model, time equals distance divided by an estimated average speed. Their average speed was 55 mph (104.61 miles ÷ 1.9 hours).”

“I’m with you, Curmudge. Because the MapSeek routing uses Highway 26, their average speed must have been adjusted for slowing down in Rosendale to avoid getting a speeding ticket and perhaps also for the possibility of getting stuck behind a farmer pulling a load of manure on 26, a two-lane highway. But is the best route now using Highway 26 through Rosendale? U.S. 151 is now four lanes all the way from Fond du Lac to Madison. Perhaps we should give this new information to MapSeek so they can adjust their model.”

“That would certainly seem to be the proper thing to do, Julie. But let’s consider this hypothetical case. Suppose the MapSeek people own a coffee shop in Rosendale. They wouldn’t want to change their recommended route and their model because it would hurt their coffee shop’s business. That’s called having a vested interest in their model and the data that go into it. MapSeek would prefer that we shut up about there being a better route; perhaps they might even try to suppress all discussions of alternate ways to go from Appleton to Madison.”

“Hey, that’s not fair! We all depend on MapSeek for the correct information.”

“It’s a sad story, Julie. We can see through what Mapseek might do because it’s hard to color the results from a simple, transparent model based on a classical equation. In addition, Mapseek’s work can be easily tested empirically. But when a bunch of suspect data are poured into a complex computer model that is arcane, abstruse, and tentative, anything can happen. That is especially true when someone has a vested interest in the outcome.”

“(Although Curmudge uses words that are known to only a few people and are hard for the rest of us to understand, I get the picture.) Hey, Curmudge, your story is an allegory, isn’t it? May I explain its lesson?”

“Go ahead, but don’t get too specific.”

“Think critically. Be slow to accept the conclusions of investigators attempting to model a complex process when their work is supported—even indirectly—by people with a vested interest in their results.”

Kaizen Curmudgeon

*Our apologies to MapQuest for using a name similar to theirs in this totally hypothetical example.

Link to posting from blog archives: Stan’s Story 10/30/08

http://kaizencurmudgeon.blogspot.com/2008/10/stans-story.html