It Is The Sun

[TDPerk]

global warming might cause massive fresh water flow due to snow melt into the Atlantic Ocean; this in turn would disrupt the long range deep oceanic convection current, causing it to shut down. This would then cause cooling in the northern Hemisphere

Trouble is, the Gulf Stream is going strong.

[MSimon]

tom.

The solar model predicts cooling for at least the next 20 years. The CO2 model does not.

The test is in progress. Would 20 years of cooling convince you?

Well a few years back I recall that they (the GW supporters) were making the argument that global warming might cause massive fresh water flow due to snow melt into the Atlantic Ocean; this in turn would disrupt the long range deep oceanic convection current, causing it to shut down. This would then cause cooling in the northern Hemisphere; in other words they already have hedged their bets by having an "explantion" ready; just in case some anomalous pesky hiatus/cooling takes place.

Except that if the melt does not happen that explanation doesn't work. Cooling is in progress. No melt has been noticed.

[williatw]

Except that if the melt does not happen that explanation doesn't work. Cooling is in progress. No melt has been noticed.

Global Warming May Trigger Winter Cooling



Hot and cold. Warmer-than-average summers and the loss of sea ice in the Arctic can lead to frigid winters and excessive snowfall. (Matlock, United Kingdom, shown during the record-cold month of December 2010.)

In general, global average temperatures have been rising since the late 1800s, but the most rapid warming has occurred in the past 40 years. And average temperatures in the Arctic have been rising at nearly twice the global rate, says Judah Cohen, a climate modeler at the consulting firm Atmospheric and Environmental Research in Lexington, Massachusetts. Despite that trend, winters in the Northern Hemisphere have grown colder and more extreme in southern Canada, the eastern United States, and much of northern Eurasia, with England's record-setting cold spell in December 2010 as a case in point.

A close look at climate data from 1988 through 2010, including the extent of land and sea respectively covered by snow and ice, helps explain how global warming drives regional cooling, Cohen and his colleagues report online today in Environmental Research Letters. In their study, the researchers combined climate and weather data from a variety of sources to estimate Eurasian snow cover, and then they speculated about how that factor might have influenced winter weather elsewhere in the Northern Hemisphere.

First, the strong warming in the Arctic in recent decades, among other factors, has triggered widespread melting of sea ice. More open water in the Arctic Ocean has led to more evaporation, which moisturizes the overlying atmosphere, the researchers say. Previous studies have linked warmer-than-average summer months to increased cloudiness over the ocean during the following autumn. That, in turn, triggers increased snow coverage in Siberia as winter approaches. As it turns out, the researchers found, snow cover in October has the largest effect on climate in subsequent months.

That's because widespread autumn snow cover in Siberia strengthens a semipermanent high-pressure system called, appropriately enough, the Siberian high, which reinforces a climate phenomenon called the Arctic Oscillation and steers frigid air southward to midlatitude regions throughout the winter.

"This is completely plausible," says Anne Nolin, a climate scientist at Oregon State University in Corvallis. The correlations between warm summers and cold winters that originally led the researchers to develop their idea don't prove cause and effect, but analyzing these trends with climate models in future studies could help researchers bolster what Nolin calls "an interesting set of connections."

"Northern Eurasia is the largest snow-covered landmass in the world each winter," she notes. It only makes sense, she argues, that it would have a big influence on the Northern Hemisphere's climate. Indeed, she adds, previous studies have noted the link between Siberian snow cover and climate in the northern Pacific.

The team's analyses suggest that climate cycles such as the El Niño-Southern Oscillation, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, and the Atlantic multidecadal oscillation can't explain the regional cooling trends seen in the Northern Hemisphere during the past couple of decades as well as trends in Siberian snow cover do. If better accounts of autumn snow-cover variability are incorporated into climate models, scientists could provide more accurate winter-weather forecasts, the researchers contend.

In other words the observed cooling which they don't deny can be explained away by the warming....the warming causes cooling, they say; in other words, hedging their bets.





http://news.sciencemag.org/2012/01/glob ... er-cooling

[MSimon]

Despite that trend, winters in the Northern Hemisphere have grown colder and more extreme in southern Canada, the eastern United States, and much of northern Eurasia, with England's record-setting cold spell in December 2010 as a case in point.

2013/14 needs to be added to 2010/11.

And warming causes cooling. 'There are some ideas so absurd that only an intellectual could believe them.' - George Orwell

[tomclarke]

Despite that trend, winters in the Northern Hemisphere have grown colder and more extreme in southern Canada, the eastern United States, and much of northern Eurasia, with England's record-setting cold spell in December 2010 as a case in point.

2013/14 needs to be added to 2010/11.

And warming causes cooling. 'There are some ideas so absurd that only an intellectual could believe them.' - George Orwell

Only someone not familiar with global weather patterns would say that. The mechanism here is weakening of the temperature difference driven Jet Stream.

[MSimon]

Despite that trend, winters in the Northern Hemisphere have grown colder and more extreme in southern Canada, the eastern United States, and much of northern Eurasia, with England's record-setting cold spell in December 2010 as a case in point.

2013/14 needs to be added to 2010/11.

And warming causes cooling. 'There are some ideas so absurd that only an intellectual could believe them.' - George Orwell

Only someone not familiar with global weather patterns would say that. The mechanism here is weakening of the temperature difference driven Jet Stream.

How about an alternative hypothesis? Lower solar input is weakening the the jet stream (well causing it to move towards the equator actually).

[tomclarke]

How about an alternative hypothesis? Lower solar input is weakening the the jet stream (well causing it to move towards the equator actually).

I've got nothing against that - but no evidence for it. Whereas there is now good evidence (models showing how it works) for the temperature difference thing. Also the change in temperature differential is clearly observed, and new. I'm not sure that the solar wind now is measured as anything special compared with history?

The weird weather in UK is caused (according to this theory) by the jet stream meandering - it has moved (and got stuck) both more N than usual, and more S than usual, whereas it is usually directly on top of UK thus giving us typical unpredictable weather.

[MSimon]

How about an alternative hypothesis? Lower solar input is weakening the the jet stream (well causing it to move towards the equator actually).

I've got nothing against that - but no evidence for it. Whereas there is now good evidence (models showing how it works) for the temperature difference thing. Also the change in temperature differential is clearly observed, and new. I'm not sure that the solar wind now is measured as anything special compared with history?

The weird weather in UK is caused (according to this theory) by the jet stream meandering - it has moved (and got stuck) both more N than usual, and more S than usual, whereas it is usually directly on top of UK thus giving us typical unpredictable weather.

The high quality data record is short. We will learn more now that the sun is going quiet. But Maunder, Dalton, etc. are suggestive data points.

And I found this interesting:

http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2012/02/ ... schenbach/

[williatw]

How about an alternative hypothesis? Lower solar input is weakening the the jet stream (well causing it to move towards the equator actually).

I've got nothing against that - but no evidence for it. Whereas there is now good evidence (models showing how it works) for the temperature difference thing. Also the change in temperature differential is clearly observed, and new. I'm not sure that the solar wind now is measured as anything special compared with history?

The weird weather in UK is caused (according to this theory) by the jet stream meandering - it has moved (and got stuck) both more N than usual, and more S than usual, whereas it is usually directly on top of UK thus giving us typical unpredictable weather.

And the question still stands: how many more years of "hiatus" (possible cooling) do the GW models allow before it becomes an undeniable anomaly that they have to admit the GW models don't adequately explain?

[tomclarke]

The models as it stands accurately model the hiatus if you force them to have the right ENSO phase, which is been predominately La Nina (cold) over the last 15 years. We are 80% likely to have el Nino (hot) this winter, but that does not answer whether the unusually strong la Nina bias will continue. So I guess the answer is that things can go on running colder than model typical as long as the ENSO stays unusually switched towards La Nina. You would not expect that, but of course its alwys possible that GW so far has switched something and El Nino much less likely will be a permanent feature. In which case the models will be inaccurate till they can work out what has biassed the ENSO and include that.

How about an alternative hypothesis? Lower solar input is weakening the the jet stream (well causing it to move towards the equator actually).

I've got nothing against that - but no evidence for it. Whereas there is now good evidence (models showing how it works) for the temperature difference thing. Also the change in temperature differential is clearly observed, and new. I'm not sure that the solar wind now is measured as anything special compared with history?

The weird weather in UK is caused (according to this theory) by the jet stream meandering - it has moved (and got stuck) both more N than usual, and more S than usual, whereas it is usually directly on top of UK thus giving us typical unpredictable weather.

And the question still stands: how many more years of "hiatus" (possible cooling) do the GW models allow before it becomes an undeniable anomaly that they have to admit the GW models don't adequately explain?

[JoeP]

I'm thinking about motivations now. The right motivation makes even genuine scientists political.

Marketing. You gotta hand it to the warmists side for marketing. It has grown to a worldwide multi-billion dollar gold mine. When the label "Global Warming" did not sync with recent reports or projections, they simply changed it to "Climate Change." Ah yes, how genius. The climate...changes...all the time. Got it. Its bad no matter what...because of people...well mainly the first world hogging all the energy. I see. That is why it is really cold. Or hot. Stormy. Or not. Right. Look, "they" OWE the rest of us cash for this bad stuff! That'll fix it. Must buy carbon credits from those that deserve compensation.

What is that you say? A technical solution using fission?
But...oh no...we can't go to fission. Silly!
But...isn't that is the only current tech that scales well enough in power to replace every fossil fuel. Why not go there?

Must I spell it out for you? Fool, fission is purely BAD. Only bad people like you could even suggest such a thing.

(I ask, what is worse? The Global Warming prediction were DIRE! Weren't they? Earth is in the balance! That fate is worse than more fission reactors, right? Crickets...apparently this line of questioning is beneath contempt!)

The king of AGW is Al Gore. A pure, self serving politician, not a scientist. After he lost his bid to be POTUS, he changed course, and became the de facto leader of a movement worldwide. Made about a billion dollars for himself in the process, if I recall correctly. Profitable! Pretty sweet deal! Reminds me a bit of L. Ron Hubbard when he decided to write a book and start a religion on a bet that he could become rich and powerful doing so. Do you think he, and all the lesser people involved will want to give up that stream of money supply...? Where is the motivation?

The pressure to conform is vast. Science? Lost in the noise I'm afraid. And even if there is some warming, is it worth the pain and deaths of all those who will suffer when access to industrial, fossil fuel powered farms, energy, water, etc, wither? Cost-benefit analysis?

[tomclarke]

I'm thinking about motivations now. The right motivation makes even genuine scientists political.


The pressure to conform is vast. Science? Lost in the noise I'm afraid.

For scientists, the pressure to publish is real, the pressure to do new work is real. Conformity is not valued, because it is the opposite of novelty.

If you look at the literature on climate change you will find a vast range of work, and in as far as it directly relates to ECS you will find work suggesting the value is 50% lower or 50% higher than the "consensus mean".

The denialists who find it difficult to get published do because their work is scientifically wrong. (You will find most of the denialist "papers" make arguments never having looked at previous work in a vacuum - and therefore also make bad mistakes).

The requirement to critically appraise previous work and put your stuff into context is not a requirement to conform. You can appraise previous work and point out what it is all wrong and something completely different is true. Which does not mean others will agree, but that is science for you. It is vital to allow diversity.

I agree that on the internet the science often gets lost in the noise. But not for the scientists. Most of them are not political (though a few are highly political).

Look at it the other way round. Consider the denialists (those internet publishing anti-AGW stuff without much science that is high enough quality to get through peer review). You will find they are highly political. 100%. Because for them the p[olitics comes before the science (which they are not much good at).

There are a very few genuine scientists publishing anti-AGW stuff who are not political. You would expect that. Weird ideas get there space. The fact that this stuff gets published shows there is no pressure to conform.

[MSimon]

I'm thinking about motivations now. The right motivation makes even genuine scientists political.


The pressure to conform is vast. Science? Lost in the noise I'm afraid.

For scientists, the pressure to publish is real, the pressure to do new work is real. Conformity is not valued, because it is the opposite of novelty.

If you look at the literature on climate change you will find a vast range of work, and in as far as it directly relates to ECS you will find work suggesting the value is 50% lower or 50% higher than the "consensus mean".

The denialists who find it difficult to get published do because their work is scientifically wrong. (You will find most of the denialist "papers" make arguments never having looked at previous work in a vacuum - and therefore also make bad mistakes).

The requirement to critically appraise previous work and put your stuff into context is not a requirement to conform. You can appraise previous work and point out what it is all wrong and something completely different is true. Which does not mean others will agree, but that is science for you. It is vital to allow diversity.

I agree that on the internet the science often gets lost in the noise. But not for the scientists. Most of them are not political (though a few are highly political).

Look at it the other way round. Consider the denialists (those internet publishing anti-AGW stuff without much science that is high enough quality to get through peer review). You will find they are highly political. 100%. Because for them the p[olitics comes before the science (which they are not much good at).

There are a very few genuine scientists publishing anti-AGW stuff who are not political. You would expect that. Weird ideas get there space. The fact that this stuff gets published shows there is no pressure to conform.

Tom,

I'm not sure if you have followed the Drug War literature but for at least 40 years all that got published was articles demonizing drugs. That is what the government paid for. It is only in the last 10 or 15 years that the literature has started to become more balanced. And in the past the same rationale was given. "The pro drug people are wrong. And EVIL besides." You can still see remnants of that on various threads around here.

I'm sorry to tell you, but you are a remnant. You just don't know it.

We are headed for a little ice age. The weather is going to blow the CO2 theories out of the water. No scientists required.

[JoeP]

For scientists, the pressure to publish is real, the pressure to do new work is real. Conformity is not valued, because it is the opposite of novelty.

You need to be a little more skeptical.

You seem to think that the pressure to publish non-conforming work is what is valued as the overriding motivation. What about supporting reality? Ostensibly, this is what both sides say they are trying to do. So what other factors are involved?

I outlined the flow of money and political power which is pretty much all arranged to support the warmist viewpoint. Whether right or wrong scientifically, the positive feedback of this kind of support is huge. You ignore or play down these points. Grant money, study money, professorships, not to mention the billions in allied business ventures are all propping up one side of things. Popular culture. My kids come home from school with this kind of anti-CO2, oil based energy is pure evil programming on them ever since they have attended as toddlers.

And only one technology we have right now can solve the emissions crisis. (If it is to be seriously considered a crisis. Is it?) Fission. And that is suppressed.

In the interim, natural gas would help some too. It is a cleaner technology and at least burns completely. Yet witness the anti-fracking hysteria. (How bad is warming and pollution again?)

No, only wind and solar are the approved solutions. And dirty fossil fuels if you PAY someone carbon credits so they can supposedly plant trees in some 3rd world backwater nation somewhere. Yeah, that'll happen. That'll work.

All politics aside, I'm all for developing wind and solar paths since I don't want us to use any more oil/coal/gas than we need to by burning it. But I can also do a bit of math and know that these technologies cannot quickly scale up to enough power to feed humanities requirements. If ever. Thus the comments in this thread about population control as the other side of the warmists solution. Now that is getting into Orwellian territory or worse.

Edit: some typo fixes. Lesson: don't eat your breakfast and type one handed.

[hanelyp]

I'm not sure if you have followed the Drug War literature ...

And as he was eventually bound to, he steps in it.