Two New Books Confirm Global Warming Is Natural, Moderate

66 thoughts on “Two New Books Confirm Global Warming Is Natural, Moderate”

1. I think what you should be asking however is how do creation stories influence the way we structure and organize knowledge? Only a few creation stories exist such as the Big Bang, Genesis, the Gilgamesh epic, Greek mythology, etc. What is necessary is to compare the narratives with each other to determine which each reveal.

   It seems like you’re approaching this from a decidedly postmodern, text-based perspective. That can be a useful tool to understand a cultural narrative, but it does de-emphasize the intent of the “author” of the story.

   You have to understand that I take Genesis to be one of the most important texts ever to be written for many reasons

   I don’t think the importance of the influence of Genesis on Western Civilization can be overstated.

2. Fr. Jacobse Ref.: George Gilder’s Thesis.
   First, how did a discussion on climate changd end up on blogs about evolution’s ‘philosophical materialism‘?
   There are theoretical asides that are in direct relations to his concepts: There is an agreement and no argument that, ‘ DNA bears the messages but it’s chemistry is irrellevant to it’s content…without help from their bonds with the helical sugar-phosphate backbone that frames them’.
   If the ‘source codes- the implanted information-are intended to become hierarchical than they would effect all cellular structures, i.e. the neural structures-the brain and therefor the mind-that carry the electrical impulses of information. Here the sematics of free-will could come under discernment.
   Evolution is envolved with species and their changes and the evolvement of new and different species. These processes are concerned with the changes on the mDNA and DNA
   Structures; Mr.Gelder’s substrate. He uses the analogy of a paper with words written on it; the words and the thoughts conveyed are independent of the paper. Yes! If you fold the paper and cut paperdolls out of it then the messages read are not the same as before. When the mDNA and DNA structures change-mutation-as the current Bird Flu changes it’s ‘substrate’ so as to go from bird to infect cats and then to infect humans you will have a new source code-new information to deal with.
   Source codes are mathamatical-0 and 1-and therefor can be placed within a mathamatical sematic, Bobinson’s mathamatical sentence structure and Gödel’s annotations, to deal with 1st, 2nd, and 3rd degree logic systems. Then, the source codes are applicable to Gödel’s 1st and 2nd Incompleteness Theorems-proved manytimes over-and therefor he should use a different level of logic to prove completeness of of his own system. He is not using a Turning Machine, maybe the use of matrix algebra would work. The sematics of sentence configurations in the mathamatical logic systems are distanced from the ‘Meta’ systems as in metaphysics or dialectical materialism.
   You are right, maybe new terminology should be found for discussions on political outlooks and the ‘phychologicalphysics’of philosophy.
   Sincerely J R Dittbrenner

3. RE:54

   JR,

   Reading the Gilder piece I also thought of Godel. When Gilder writes,

   After 100 years or so of attempted philosophical leveling, however, it turns out that the universe is stubbornly hierarchical. It is a top-down “nested hierarchy,” in which the higher levels command more degrees of freedom than the levels below them, which they use and constrain. Thus, the higher levels can neither eclipse the lower levels nor be reduced to them.

   It seems like he arbitrarily stops at Principia Mathematica and ignores Incompleteness altogether. I agree with your statement about source codes/mathematical semantic, so if “All consistent axiomatic formulations of number theory include undecidable propostitions (Hofstadter)” how can we describe the universe as “stubbornly hierarchical?” A hierarchy as Gilder seems to characterize it would require a foolproof algorithm for deciding every possible switch in the tree. I don’t think he’s got it.

   Anyway, I enjoyed your post. Haven’t thought about that stuff in a long time.

4. Jeffrey Sachs responds to the WSJ and defends the Hockey Stick:

   Fiddling While the Planet Burns , Scientific American

   Will the Wall Street Journal’s editorial writers accept a challenge to learn the truth about the science of global climate change?
   By Jeffrey D. Sachs

   The Wall Street Journal editorial page has for years railed against these scientific findings on climate change, even as the global consensus has reached nearly 100 percent of the scientific community, including the reports commissioned by the skeptical Bush White House. Thus, the hockey stick became the bête noire of the editorial page as well as of the dwindling “climate skeptic” community, and right-wing Congressional officials such as Representative Joe Barton of Texas, chairman of the House Subcommittee on Energy and Air Quality, took up the attack.

   In response to these growing political pressures, the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences conducted a major independent scientific review and updating of the hockey stick data and analysis. While acknowledging a range of uncertainties, that report came down squarely on the side of the Mann study. The NRC noted that “presently available proxy evidence indicates that temperatures at many, but not all, individual locations were higher during the past 25 years than during any period of comparable length since A.D. 900.” It went on to say “the committee finds it plausible that the Northern Hemisphere was warmer during the last few decades of the 20th century than during any comparable period over the preceding millennium.” They noted significant uncertainties that remain for global temperatures before 1600, but emphasized “surface temperature reconstructions for periods prior to the industrial era are only one of multiple lines of evidence supporting the conclusion that climatic warming is occurring in response to human activities, and they are not the primary evidence.”

   The Wall Street Journal editorial page completely ignored this report. Instead, it cited a report commissioned by Congressman Barton from three statisticians with no background in climate science, who quibbled with aspects of Mann’s methodology. Yet climate scientists quickly showed that addressing the criticisms has no practical effect on Mann’s conclusions. Nonetheless, on this thoroughly flimsy and misleading basis, the editorial page declared that “there’s no reason to believe that Mr. Mann, or his ‘hockey stick’ graph of global temperature changes, is right,” called the research “dubious,” and said that the climate science community “often more closely resembles a mutual-admiration society than a competitive and open-minded search for scientific knowledge.” In other words, it hid the evidence and trashed climate science.

5. Dean writes: “The Wall Street Journal editorial page completely ignored this report. Instead, it cited a report commissioned by Congressman Barton from three statisticians with no background in climate science, who quibbled with aspects of Mann’s methodology. Yet climate scientists quickly showed that addressing the criticisms has no practical effect on Mann’s conclusions.”

   Yeah, for the right, anybody can be a climate expert. Novelists, economists, statisticians, wacky survivalist physicists in rural Oregon (quoted once in this venue), former tobacco advocates (also quoted in this venue) are all climate experts, even without any background in climate science. Recently, a friend who used to teach philosophy at a university in eastern Oregon discovered that a retired philosophy professor from the same institution is now considered a “climate expert” by the right.

   The interesting question is who ISN’T a potential right-wing climate expert. The fellow on the street corner today with the sign that says “will work for food,” may tomorrow have a sign that says “will make right-wing climate predictions for food.” And why not?

6. Jim Holman, Dean Scourtes, and all lurkers of good will:

   If you are willing to read moderately difficult pieces and do a little thinking,these two pieces explain the hockey stick fiasco:

   What the Hockey Stick Debate is About

   The Wegman Report

   The discrediting of the Hockey stick says nothing about anthropogenic global warming. It does show the corruption of the IPCC, which, as I explained in another thread, is a self-selected group. Most scientists with the proper training to evaluate long-term climate effects do not subscribe to the alarmist position.

   Jim – your “tobacco advocate” was the director of the US weather satellite system and an atmospheric scientist of pretty high repute. The reason that one should listen to the statisticians is that the papers in question were fundamentally statistical analyses of tree-rings. Climate had nothing to do with the issues in contention. And to address your posting on the other thread, given that switching to nuclear power would lower GHGs by 25%, while prohibiting soccer moms from driving SUVs would lower GHGs by

7. Last post was cut off. Here is the end:

   …1%, why did you single out the SUVs for condemnation rather than pushing energetically for nuclear power? What is your agenda?

   Dean – Jeffrey Sachs is a publicity-hungry economist. The Wegman report does not “quibble” with the methodology, it destroys it. The NRC report actually vindicates McIntyre and McKitrick, and the word “plausible” does not mean “probable”. The “climate scientists who quickly showed that the criticisms had no effect” were all co-authors of Mann, and thus were not independent. See Wegman’s social network analysis for an understanding. The former director of the Dutch Meteorological Society said that Mann had “disgraced the profession”.

   I don’t think that you two have the willingness to read and think critically about this topic. Easier to link to op-ed pieces and politicians.

8. Here is exactly what the National Research Council, an arm of the National Academy of Science, reported to Congress:

   ‘High Confidence’ That Planet Is Warmest in 400 Years;
   Less Confidence in Temperature Reconstructions Prior to 1600

   WASHINGTON — There is sufficient evidence from tree rings, boreholes, retreating glaciers, and other “proxies” of past surface temperatures to say with a high level of confidence that the last few decades of the 20th century were warmer than any comparable period in the last 400 years, according to a new report from the National Research Council. Less confidence can be placed in proxy-based reconstructions of surface temperatures for A.D. 900 to 1600, said the committee that wrote the report, although the available proxy evidence does indicate that many locations were warmer during the past 25 years than during any other 25-year period since 900. Very little confidence can be placed in statements about average global surface temperatures prior to A.D. 900 because the proxy data for that time frame are sparse, the committee added.

   ..The committee pointed out that surface temperature reconstructions for periods before the Industrial Revolution — when levels of atmospheric greenhouse gases were much lower — are only one of multiple lines of evidence supporting the conclusion that current warming is occurring in response to human activities, and they are not the primary evidence.

   The National Research Council is the principal operating arm of the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering. It is a private, nonprofit institution that provides science and technology advice under a congressional charter.

   This report further discredits the continued use of the “Junk Science” tag in connection with discussions of global warming. I would respectfully request that the junk science tag be removed as it is completely unjustified and incorrect.

9. The Two Books
   It would appear that for the scriptural inerrant, the young Earth believers, that these two books would constitute an anathema to belief; the authors use geologic time frames in their texts.
   Besides, to many of the inerrant believers this warming trend is a sign post for the end times and the Rapture; consummation devoutly to be wished for.
   Sincerely, J R Dittbrenner

10. Note 56. Dean, a bit more skepticism might be in order. Scientific American touted the claims of the phony Korean stem cell messiah a while back, remember? They had to apologize.

    Jim writes:

    Yeah, for the right, anybody can be a climate expert.

    Like Al Gore, perhaps?

    J R Dittbrenner writes:

    Besides, to many of the inerrant believers this warming trend is a sign post for the end times and the Rapture; consummation devoutly to be wished for.

    Not only for “inerrant believers” but secular apocalypticists as well, although the final scenario plays out differently of course.

11. Dean Scourtes:

    In your comment #60 you quote the report’s conclusion that current temperatures are the warmest in 400 years, based on multiple lines of evidence. Since 400 years ago the world was entering a period known as the Little Ice Age, the statement is of little value, let alone controversy. The report goes on to say that “many locations during the past 25 years” are warmer today than they were during a 25 year period going back to 900. Even though I would dispute this, I will asume that it is true for the sake of argument, but so what? Look how highly qualified the statement is.

    The fact remains that there is massive evidence of a 300-400 year era called the medieval warm period, where world-wide temperature were consistently higher than they have been this century. The corruption I am trying to get you to admit is the purposeful manipulation of data by Mann et. al. (which continues to this day, if you bother to research it) which meant to eliminate the WMP for political purposes. The fact that not one member of the IPCC questioned this outrageous piece of propaganda shows how much of a farce the whole thing is.

    For those interested in more on this, and in particular the strong correspondence of global temperatures and solar activity, see this: The Hockey Stick

    Mr. Scourtes – I’m just curious, have you read any of the things that I linked to? If so, what think ye?

    Look, hardly anyone has ever disputed that temperatures have been rising, and that carbon dioxide might contribute a small amount of additional warming. What has been disputed all along is that this constitutes cause for alarm. If you do question the cause for alarm, the AGW advocates say “you don’t believe it is getting warmer” – a dishonest ploy.

    The whole alarmist/take action thing is insane. Polar bears are drowning! so go buy a compact fluorescent light bulb! The gulf stream is going to reverse! so go buy a hybrid car! But whatever you do, don’t build a nuclear power plant to cut emissions by 25%! Better to cut out 2% of our carbon emissions by feel-good measures.

    Scare tactics for the innumerate and gullible.

12. Mr. Chresand: You write “scare tactics are for the innumerate and gullible”, suggesting that the Hockey Stick theory is easily revealed as a piece of shoddy research. This is certainly not true. You refer to criticism by Canadian mathematician Stephen McIntyre and economist Ross McKitrick that Mann’s work was riddled with “collation errors, unjustifiable truncations or extrapolation of source data, obsolete data, geographical location errors, incorrect calculations of principal components, and other quality control defects.”

    In fact, these claims have been demonstrated to be incorrect by an independent group of scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) . These authors have shown that the ‘alternative’ reconstruction promoted by McIntyre and McKitrick (which disagrees not only with the Mann et al reconstruction, but nearly a dozen independent reconstructions that agreee with the Mann et al reconstruction within statistical uncertainties) is the result of censoring of key data from the original Mann et al (1998) dataset. Unlike the original reconstruction of Mann et al (1998), the reconstruction that McIntyre and McKitrick produced using the censored data set fails standard statistical tests for validity, and, in the words of the NCAR group, is “shown to be without statistical and climatological merit“.

    The Wall Street Journal vs. The Scientific Consensus

    You seem to think that because the effects of global warming may not be felt in the five or ten years, or perhaps not even in our generation, any suggestions that we might act to mitagate the problem before it worsens are alarmist. First, Christian ethics teach us that we are stewards of the earth entrusted with maintaining it in good condition for future generations. So it is not only our own welfare we are required to look after, but that of our children as well.

    Second, as you know problems are easier to address and remedy in their early stages than they are when they become, full blown crises and catastrophies later on. As Dr. Jim Hansen of NASA has stated, some of the effects of global warming will be “irreversible”. Species who become extinct and fresh water glaciers that melt will not return. Cities that go under water could remain in their Atlantean state for hundreds of years to come. Carbon emissions that accumulate the atmosphere will take several centuries to diminish even with the most stringent controls.

    Clearly the cost of a false positive when it comes to global warming, (introducing new, cleaner technologies) is much, much less than the cost of a false negative (flooding, extinction, famine, drought, and war). This is why I consider the advocacy of a policy of willful indifference and deliberate abdication of responsibility when it comes to a potential environmental catastophe (that the scientific consensus considers to be at least “plausible”) to be so dangerously irrational and immoral.

13. Mr. Scourtes;

    This quote which you supplied in comment #64

    In fact, these claims have been demonstrated to be incorrect by an independent group of scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) . These authors have shown that the ‘alternative’ reconstruction promoted by McIntyre and McKitrick (which disagrees not only with the Mann et al reconstruction, but nearly a dozen independent reconstructions that agreee with the Mann et al reconstruction within statistical uncertainties) is the result of censoring of key data from the original Mann et al (1998) dataset. Unlike the original reconstruction of Mann et al (1998), the reconstruction that McIntyre and McKitrick produced using the censored data set fails standard statistical tests for validity, and, in the words of the NCAR group, is “shown to be without statistical and climatological merit“.

    The Wall Street Journal vs. The Scientific Consensus

    came from the website “Realclimate” which is run by Michael Mann. The links embedded in the quote are from Ammann et. al. Ammann is Mann’s former student and frequent co-author. Moreover, the paper they reference as refuting the M&M criticisms was rejected for publication.

    Let’s take a breath and sum this up. Mann and Ammann are under attack for their dishonest and shoddy work. They put out something that looks like a press release on a website that Mann operates. In the press release they refer again to their own work as if it was independent confirmation of the original paper. Unbelievable.

    Their claim of global temperature for the last 1000 years depends on a single species of tree in California that grew quickly in the 20th century, even though the temperature of the region cooled. In other words, the tree rings did not even refect the local temperature. So, how do they justify using it to explain global temperature? Mann, Ammann et.al. claim that the tree reflected global temperature due to “teleconnection”, meaning that the global climate was somehow supposed to be recorded in the tree growth even though the local temperatures went the other way. Unbelievable.

    And persons such as yourself say that we skeptics are unscientific, led by religious beliefs, etc.

    How do they get away with this? The only explanation is that most media outlets do not bother to dig into the facts because it spoils the pre-determined narrative.

    I got a kick, by the way out of the press release regarding Richard Branson’s prize offer (for technologies to remove carbon dioxide). The judges will be:

    1) James Hansen – who the majority of atmospheric scientists believe has lost his mind;

    2) James Lovelock – who thinks the earth is a gigantic organism named Gaia who is mad and is seeking revenge on humans for polluting;

    3) Crispin Tickell – who wrote a book in the 70s warning that the earth is entering an ice age, and that the only hope for mankind would be to turn over control of world economy to the UN.

    How can you hitch your wagon to this parade of liars and lunatics?

14. “…the corruption I am trying to get you to admit is the purposeful manipulation of data…”

    Won’t happen – does not fit his ideology. “Global warming” and it’s fixes just fit too neatly in the progressive agenda. They CAN’T be wrong or even “nuanced” because they have prior and more important commitments. By the way, I appreciate the facts you bring Mr. Chresand…

15. “came from the website “Realclimate” which is run by Michael Mann.”

    Dean has the style (and could very well be) a middle school student who is trying to get ahead on his debate team. He is not interested in the meaning of what you say, but in the ideoligical content so he can oppose it to his own. He cribs from websites all the time like this. He assumes your arguements and positions are informed by the same surface “media” that his are.

    Dean we ask again, “what is man”?..”came from the website “Realclimate” which is run by Michael Mann.”

    Dean has the style (and himself could very well be) a middle school student who is trying to get ahead on his debate team. He is not interested in the meaning of what you say, but in the ideological content so he can oppose it to his own. He cribs from websites all the time like this. He assumes your arguments and positions are informed by the same surface “media” that his are.

    Dean we ask again, “what is man”?…

16. Christopher – In the context of this discussion, man is the entity that has been endowed by God with intellegence and free will and entrusted by God with the stewardship of this planet we are residing upon.

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