What Was That About?
The climate debate, with all its rivalries, melodramatic clashes, and endless reprisals, often resembles a modern-day Hatfield-McCoy feud.
So it’s refreshing when someone remains above the fray and takes
an indepth look at the actual science being discussed.
That would be Zeke over at the Yale Forum on Climate Change & the Media, drilling down on the latest bloodletting episode.
That isn’t an in-depth look; it is just the surface.
leave it to WC to not find anything good to say about Zeke’s piece.
If you want an in depth look WC then whip out your control theory and head over to CA to discuss Bode plots. You won’t keep up. Having spent a fair amount of time working with control theory scientists and engineers and having read your stuff, I’ll predict you will sit in the peanut gallery and our of the frequency domain.
Zeke, did a fine job of summarizing the primary scientific issues. Anything beyond that gets into specialties, specialties where you’d be lost. But astound me. Head over to CA. The matlab code is there and if you have trouble with that Eric Steig is giving classes.
William,
Depth is somewhat relative. The Yale Forum audience limits how technical pieces can be so, for example, a discussion of Dessler’s critique of SB11’s equation 1 would be a bit much.
I tend to do more science blogging (as opposed to summarizing/reporting) over here: http://rankexploits.com/musings/author/zeke_h/
Just leave it to Connelly to pollute the pool. He thinks the world should be run like Stoat, where he dictates who does and does not get a voice. It’s not that Zeke was superficial. It’s just that Zeke didn’t go through approved channels–i.e., Connelly.
The world of the climate-concerned where you can wake up with the ambition of saving the planet and before nightfall you write
“how do you deal with a scientist like Roy Spencer”
Tom F-
And are you only to happy to wade in the pool? Why must you personalize things and make unsubstantiated speculation. William’s known to have a tart tongue, but in this case all he’s done is assert that Zeke’s post was not in-depth.
Better to emulate Zeke tactful response on this, methinks.
Keith, you confuse acid with tart. Zeke was indeed tactful. However, I have no patience with people like Connelly. Did he offer any substance? No, he did not.
It would have taken little effort to show where and why he felt Zeke was being overly facile. But he chose the drive-by snark approach. Which is why that’s all he deserves in return.
It’s not personal at all, Keith. It’s mirroring. I engage people on the level they play at.
“Did he offer any substance?”
Tom can you guess what I’m going to say next?
Marlowe, why would I care?
It’s rather puzzling that #1 (WC) would invoke vile responses #2 (SM) and #4 (TF). #1 is a benign accurate observation. #3 (ZH) makes a good point, that “in depth” is relative, and the post was perhaps detailed for a lay audience. Seems our dynamic duo is engaging in the the usual trolling/positioning. Childish schoolyard stuff really.
@ Zeke –
Why does Dessler, and why do you, talk about the clouds “trapping energy [heat]”. That makes no sense to me. The issue is that clouds reflect sunlight, right?
It’s rather puzzling that #4(TF) would invoke vile responses from #10(NWJ) since #6(KK) had previously made the point clear. Childish schoolyard stuff really.
Tom C,
In addition to scattering incoming radiation, clouds absorb heat reradiating from the Earth’s surface and prevent the heat from escaping.
See this for example: http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2002/22apr_ceres/
@Zeke –
That is true, but from an energy balance standpoint, isn’t it true that the daytime reflective aspect far outweighs the night-time absorbtion aspect? So, the net effect is toward cooling.
We can never be above the fray, Kieth, though it’s a nice dream to think we could be. “10,000 feet above man and politics!” Wow wee! But not being disengious or childish, this ‘dry’ debate is probably the most profond we’re gonna have: What is man? What is his relationship to the world (the enviroment)? What is his future? Or is that the question? Or life is not something the living can be above? Only a philospher could do that and we have no more philosophers, have we, Kieth?
Lewis,
Believe me, you do not want a philosopher to take a look at these jousts.
Tom C (#14),
A more general overview of clouds.
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/Clouds/
The net effect depends on the type of cloud, high clouds trapping more heat than they reflect, low clouds reflecting more heat. The net effect of all clouds is to cool the lower atmosphere. What matters to the topic of climate feedbacks is how different types of cloud cover changes in response to warming. I think Zeke could clarify the paragraph you refer to.
Switching gears, Dessler’s correspondence with Revkin is notable.
Not all claims in science have equal merit, especially when one claim is of the extraordinary nature and lacks any good evidence to support it.
Zeke (and Emanuel) point out that the Spencer paper itself is rather reserved, to the point where I’m not sure it can really be considered a skeptical paper, but also clearly spun heavily by Spencer himself and sympathetic media outlets.
True, Willard, but I was interested in an ironic contrast between Keith’s profession and a hoary old cliche of being ‘above’ the fray. Though I would setttle for a ‘mere’ Emerson myself. As someone once said: “You look out of the window and observe the bus. But I am the bus!” Or it is not our lack of objectivity and ‘being above the fray’ that is the problem, but our lack of subjectivity and gnosis auton, a radical honesty that would probably just leave one or two of us standing.
You get a fine crop of trolls, Keith.
My point (which some alas were too dull to realise) was that ZH’s piece adds nothing new. It isn’t an in-depth summary, it is just a re-hash of stuff we’ve seen elsewhere. If you want depth, you need to read RC or Dessler’s paper or somesuch. Which is why the comments here are just a re-hash, too.
Um Connelly, we got your ‘point’ the first time you laid it on a doorstep. Thank you for your totally unsupported assertions. We will assess your bald statements with exactly the degree of gravity they deserve. Yawn.
@NewYorkJ
From the link you sent, end of last paragraph:
“The balance between the cooling and warming actions of clouds is very close although, overall, averaging the effects of all the clouds around the globe, cooling predominates.”
Which is also in accord with common sense and experience.
If water vapor increase in the atmosphere it seems plausible that it will have an effect on clouds. Increase or decrease? I don’t know, but probably highly complex and certainly a valid topic for study. Dessler, Connelly offer dogmatic assertions that don’t seem warranted.
All the talk of the potential warming vs cooling of clouds seems to miss that while we need to research this, in either case it is not yet observable, while the positive feedback from other factors such as decrease of ice, methane release, water vapor, etc, is observable, intuitive, and to some degree measurable. So it is the hypothetical vs the observable. And to whatever degree there is negative feedback from clouds, it was not enough to overwhelm positive feedback in past episodes of climate change that we can study. But maybe it will be different this time!
Which is why I think that those who hold on to low sensitivity with this as their reason are really grasping at straws. Unlike some of the silly things we see elsewhere, it is not an anti-science position and cannot be disproven. But I liken it more to those who still disagree that birds evolved from dinosaurs. Holding on to some tidbit (a little bone in an ankle) that as of yet is still under contention while the strong weight of evidence goes against it. And if the tables were turned, they would generally be the biggest critics of somebody who held such a position against the prevailing weight of evidence. You’re wagging the tail of the bell curve.
Dean –
Thanks for your thoughtful comments.
So, what was it that was being fed back on in these “past episodes of climate change”. What was the forcing that was generating the positive feedbacks?
Dean, what you say makes good sense. What also makes good sense is the observation that models are running quite a bit hotter than observations, for whatever reason. Which may contribute to discussions around sensitivity.
Tom,
The mismatch between modeled and observed temperatures over the past decade may indicate lower sensitivity, but it could just as easily be a result of models failing to accurately simulate decadal-level climate variability. The AR5 model runs are going to have a strong focus on decadal-level projections (vs the focus on century-level projections in the AR4), so we will have a lot of interesting things to look at in the next few years!
Hi Zeke
Yeah it’ll be fun for all. It’d be nice to take a couple of topics off the table beforehand, though.
@ Zeke
it could just as easily be a result of models failing to accurately simulate decadal-level climate variability
How does it affect our faith in century-level projections?