I was a true believer in global warming from the late 1970s, until five years ago. From 1995-2008 I was splitting my time between Colorado, Northern California and The UK. Colorado and the UK both were in a period of dramatic warming, and it was completely obvious that it was due to CO2.
Something happened though in September, 2006. The weather turned cold and wet. I was coaching soccer in Colorado and it sucked. Every spring and fall soccer season since has been the same. Snow, wind, cold ….. Same thing in England – summers disappeared and winters got cold.
It quickly sank in that climate was cyclical, not linear. CO2 was accelerating upwards, but temperatures were getting colder. As a scientist and and engineer, I had to look elsewhere for answers.
What has surprised me is watching the spectacular dishonesty of the climate science community as this has unfolded. Previously I was under the impression that scientists were generally honest people, but now I have my doubts.
isn’t it odd all the things that are masking CO2 temp rise now….
…..that had absolutely no effect in the past
I fell for ‘Desertification’ while a climatology student, and even wrote a regrettable paper. That was after Global Cooling and before AGW. So the first time I heard the hypothesis of AGW, my first words were ‘BS’. As someone who had studied geology for eight years, spent time as a climatology student and been fooled once before, my reflexes were correct. Without that previous knowledge, I too would likely have succumbed to the madness.
Global warming was convincing, particularly in the UK because it did warm significantly. I was a disinterested believer. What rang my alarm bells was the certainty, the company and the solutions. Looking at the science came later.
When people like Al talked about settled science and debates being over, I thought ‘how unlikely is that, climate science must be really complicated and I don’t remember there being a debate?’ When they said that they were sure it was CO2 but could never explain why it wasn’t natural, I thought ‘if it’s obvious, why can’t they tell me?’
I’ve always disliked Green Peace as I’ve always supported nuclear and was immediately wary of any side they joined. Add thicky Prince Charles, celebs, greenies, journalists, the UN, the EU and glib politicians and it’s almost impossible for me to take them seriously.
The Green Peace acceptable solutions to cutting CO2 are clearly [insert obscenity of choice]. It’s obvious they’re useless but nobody admits it.
All these added up to a sales pitch that was/is trying too hard to sell. I immediately sensed something was dodgy. It didn’t take too much looking to find out what.
From a career-long geologist’s point of view, I was always skeptical of the notion that mankind could weild such enormous power over the earth and all living things.
I mean, sure, we can make a royal mess of things here and there and from time to time, but “Save the Planet”? WTF? Nearly every “human-caused disaster” has fixed itself in less than 20 years.
I think George Carlin had it spot-on.
I remember 1999 (or so) when we had a really warm February; I thought, hey that must be global warming; that’s not bad at all. Usually, February is the coldest month here in Braunschweig, Germany. So I was a believer, but I enjoyed it.
Unfortunately, that was a one-off and the winters got ever colder…
As someone that’s always been dependent on weather, and weather forecasts….
….I never once believed a bunch of glorified weathermen could predict the weather
Anyone who makes a claim that science is settled isn’t much of a scientist anyway. (Although if it is truly settled, we don’t need them anymore right? If we already know everything, there would be no need to keep paying scientists to do research in that field.) To close off any possibility that new information will prove your views to be incorrect either means they are basing their certainty solely on the faith that their views are correct, or they honestly believe that they are omniscient. I wouldn’t expect a productive discussion or debate with them either way.
Anyone who bothered to look at weather records would know that we have had mild periods before, even during the fairly recent past. The widespread hot summers of the 1930′s were like nothing we have recently seen.
Or perhaps the weather changed where you live(d), and you assumed it did the same thing everywhere else.
Here are the changes in UAH LT avg temperatures for the last 60 months (Oct06 to Oct11), compared to the 60 month period just preceding it:
Globe: 0.00 C
Global land: +0.11 C
Global oceans: -0.07 C
Northern hemisphere: +0.01 C
Southern hemisphere: -0.01 C
USA48: -0.16 C
Anyway, no one should be making conclusions about climate based on 5-year periods–the most recent one, or any other. 2010 saw one of the strongest La Ninas in recent history. And USA48 is just 1.6% of the globe, and 5.4% of the globe’s land.
But we should definitely draw conclusions based on Texas in July, 2011. Texas makes up 80% of the planet, like Moscow did in 2010.
Remember, in climate science no actual observation or thought is allowed.
Who is drawing global conclusions based on what is happening in Texas?
I see people wondering if Texas conditions are being caused by global conditions, not the other way around.
Two points about this…
1. There is nothing unusual about current temps (no ipcc hockey stick). 2. ice cores show that CO2 is correlated only as a result (NOT a cause) of temp increases (ipcc reports indicated otherwise). … Are these the best 2 points to make?
Your first point needs some refinement.
“There is nothing unusual or unprecedented about our current climate, or how we got here.”
This statement alone forces them to disprove natural variability (which they cannot), without arguing over the ‘chicken or the egg’ of CO2.
Thanks Gator.
Point 1 is meant to quickly counter the global warming idea, not so much the ambiguous “climate change.” If (unusual) warming is fully refuted, the idea of conveniently substituting “climate change” as the new boogeyman becomes a difficult sell. (And don’t forget, the alleged unusual climate variability is said to be a result of warming.)
Anyway, if one wanted to run a ~30 second spot or web ad, as support for point #1 you could quickly show the revised non hockey stick graph (with reference[s]). As you suggest, disproving “natural variability” would be a tall order.
My epiphany about AGW came indirectly. Long ago I compared ca. 1900 historic photos of glaciers I knew in the Rockies then, and had been watching them shrink all along. Seemed we were rebounding from the depths of the LIA. Which was nice.
Then came the hype. At first I sort of took it seriously. But when they started telling their Polar Bear Stories, I knew they were cranking out total hysterical BS. Then came their Pine Beetle Stories. Completely misleading. So I had to wonder. If this science was so settled, why did they need dishonest used car salesmen/blackmail techniques to sell it? Well, now I know.
In the spirit that the medium is the message, I looked at the AGW movement as an extension of the hippie movement of the ’60′s. I haven’t been disappointed.
Studying geology gives one perspective, meteorology studies, weather modelling allows one to know chaos.
I did not fall for the hype at all, I just kept in mind that, the claims of the science being settled and the scientific debate being over, were made by…a…POLITICIAN! Since the Monotone Moron’s daddy was also a career politician, where does the expectation exist that Al Gore knows anything about anything, other than how to lie, cheat, and of course steal? His segment on polar bears was the kicker though, I have to assume that, Gore’s team of crack smokers, I mean crack researchers somehow missed the polar bears official classification as an AQUATIC MAMMAL, as they were preparing their asinine claims of bears swimming for days to find seals and walruses to eat, because there weren’t any icebergs for them to hunt from.
The unmaking of my belief in global warming?
It was ~ May 2007, and I was a believer, though a conservative. I was checking some youtube like list of videos, and I saw “The Great Global Warming Swindle.” I had just seen the nutty “Loose Change” from 9-11 Truthers, and so I thought this global warming vid is probably another nutty thing… but clicked.
The 1 thing that struck me in the hour+ video was when they showed algore from his movie showing the alleged causal correlation between Co2 & temps. Algore was wrong. Co2 increased as a result of temp, not a cause!
If this is true, I thought, then the theory is bunk. Plain and simple. But I thought that the video is probably propaganda, and doesn’t show the other side of the story. So I went all over the web looking for the refutation of that point about Co2 & temp correlation, but there was none. At best, from climate authorities, was agreement with the point, but with an added “we can’t rule out that the Co2 contributes to additional warming.” (I have seen now, 4 years later, some alarmists [bull shit artists] suggest that the Co2 does in fact “amplify” later warming. But without providing any evidence at all. They just say it, and that is good enough for them for it to be true.)
So the theory was founded on bs. I was no longer a believer.
By the way, earlier on this page, I posted about the 2 key points that I’m thinking fully repudiate the theory. This failure of Co2 / temp correlation is one.
Algore was wrong. Co2 increased as a result of temp, not a cause!
Unfortunately, you’ve been mislead. You need to do more reading.
The present period is different than most past episodes of warming, because we are artificially injecting CO2 into the atmosphere. (That’s why it has a different isotopic signature.) This has never happened before in the history of the planet.
Try this exercise: look up the CO2 increase from past temperature increases (say, over the change from an interglacial to an ice age). What numbers do you get?
Then compare that number to today’s changes in CO2 and temperature change (since, say, 1850).
“we are artificially injecting CO2 into the atmosphere”
Think of it David … every time you breathe, you increase Earth’s average temperature by 0.0000000000000000000000000000000000000001 C. The horror!
“This has never happened before in the history of the planet.”
So why is it the 97% that nature puts out (volcanoes, forest fires, decaying vegetation) is OK, but we have to put carbon taxes on the 3% we contribute? BTW do you recall what the CO2 levels were (in ppm) during the time of the dinosaurs?
LLAP wrote:
every time you breathe, you increase Earth’s average temperature by 0.0000000000000000000000000000000000000001 C. The horror!
No, you don’t, because the carbon you exhale comes from carbon you ingest. It’s a net wash.
Err, David, I hate to nitpick, but we’re suddenly conflating Carbon with CO2.
What a ridiculous statement.
All the CO2 that comes out of your car’s tailpipe also came from carbon the engine ingested.
Food you eat is reduced carbon. You breath out oxidized carbon.
@David: “No, you don’t, because the carbon you exhale comes from carbon you ingest. It’s a net wash.”
The carbon you ingest (carbohydrates, fats, proteins) is sequestered carbon and therefore not a greenhouse gas. If it is a net wash like you say, then carbon sequestering is the dumbest idea ever. Similarly, if carbon sequestered in coal has the same greenhouse effect as atmospheric CO2, then let’s just mine it all and burn it because it is a net wash. See the logic?
In a paper submitted to the Hearing before the US Senate Committee on
Commerce, Science, and Transportation, Professor Zbigniew Jaworowski states,
“The notion of low pre-industrial CO2 atmospheric level, based on such poor
knowledge, became a widely accepted Holy Grail of climate warming
models. The modelers ignored the evidence from direct measurements of
CO2 in atmospheric air indicating that in 19th century its average
concentration was 335 ppmv . In Figure 2 encircled values
show a biased selection of data used to demonstrate that in 19th century
atmosphere the CO2 level was 292 ppmv. A study of stomatal frequency
in fossil leaves from Holocene lake deposits in Denmark, showing that 9400
years ago CO2 atmospheric level was 333 ppmv, and 9600 years ago 348
ppmv, falsify the concept of stabilized and low CO2 air concentration until
the advent of industrial revolution .”
And we can also get into what Dr’s Carter and Salby have to say about CO2 and it’s origins and ‘fingerprints’.
More alarmist nonsense. More model driven drivel.
suyts: If you don’t understand why scientists give emissions is either CO2 or C, go do more research.
All the CO2 that comes out of your car’s tailpipe also came from carbon the engine ingested. Food you eat is reduced carbon. You breath out oxidized carbon.
What a ridiculous statement. The carbon “ingested” by the engine just spent millions of years in the ground before someone dug it up. The carbon you exhale came from a plant that recently inhaled it, or an animal who ate a plant that inhaled it.
Sometimes reading this blog is like reading the transcript of a kindergarten class.
“No, you don’t, because the carbon you exhale comes from carbon you ingest. It’s a net wash.”
That is completely wrong.
Your body creates CO2 as it functions just like the car or plants . It is definitely NOT just the same CO2 you breathed in.
@David” The carbon “ingested” by the engine just spent millions of years in the ground before someone dug it up”
So why is time an issue? That carbon used to be part of a plant and before that was part of the atmosphere. It is simply returning to where it came from.
“Sometimes reading this blog is like reading the transcript of a kindergarten class.”
So why are you here then, O great one?
LLAP wrote:
So why is time an issue?
Because life is finite, and people have an annoying habit of needing food every few hours.
Jimash wrote:
That is completely wrong.
Your body creates CO2 as it functions just like the car or plants . It is definitely NOT just the same CO2 you breathed in.
I never said it was. Thank you.
Gator wrote:
Professor Zbigniew Jaworowski states…
The consensus is that Jaworowski was wrong.
@David: “people have an annoying habit of needing food every few hours.”
Keep an alarmist talking for a while and the truth comes out. Like just about every other alarmist I have ever encountered, there is a deep down hatred of humanity. That comment was disgusting David. Shame on you.
LLAP wrote:
So why is it the 97% that nature puts out (volcanoes, forest fires, decaying vegetation) is OK, but we have to put carbon taxes on the 3% we contribute?
Do you really not understand how human CO2 emissions alter the natural carbon cycle and are leading to an increasing level of CO2? If so you need to do some reading about the basics.
BTW do you recall what the CO2 levels were (in ppm) during the time of the dinosaurs?
Who says it’s the level that matters? Obviously life can exist on this planet over a wide range of CO2. It’s life’s ability to adapt to changes that matters, and that pertains to humans as well. Yes, we could live on a 2000 ppm Earth. What’s unclear is how the rapid changes taking place, which are expected to accelerate in pace in coming decades, will affect our ability to provide and maintain the civilization we have.
See above.
@David: “Do you really not understand how human CO2 emissions alter the natural carbon cycle and are leading to an increasing level of CO2? If so you need to do some reading about the basics.”
Typical of the snotty arrogance I have come to expect from warmists. I TEACH THIS STUFF FOR A LIVING. GET IT?
LLAP wrote:
I TEACH THIS STUFF FOR A LIVING. GET IT?
No, because you ask a lot of dumb questions that, if intended to be funny, aren’t.
@David: “No, because you ask a lot of dumb questions that, if intended to be funny, aren’t.”
Funny, I seem to recall you being the one who didn’t understand the difference between organic and inorganic carbon. Pack up your toys and go home.
@David: “The present period is different than most past episodes of warming”
On a more serious note, we should be bloody thankful we live in a period of very stable and benign climate like we do now. The warming of the 20th century (about 0.6 to 0.8C) is well within the range of natural variablity from the past. Maybe you should read what life was like in the Little Ice Age to appreciate what we have now. Try this for starters:
http://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2011/11/01/what-was-life-like-in-the-little-ice-age/
LLAP wrote:
On a more serious note, we should be bloody thankful we live in a period of very stable and benign climate like we do now.
Yes, and keeping that is what people are concerned about.
The warming of the 20th century (about 0.6 to 0.8C) is well within the range of natural variablity from the past.
Is it? Says who? What about a 1 C change since 1950, or a rate of change of 0.2 C/decade? How “natural” is that?
PS: Now that I know your past comments weren’t serious, I won’t waste my time on your future ones.
@David: “PS: Now that I know your past comments weren’t serious, I won’t waste my time on your future ones.”
Horseshit. 1C since 1950? Prove it. By the way, your above comment is rich considering you don’t even know the difference between organic and inorganic carbon. Where the hell did you get your PhD?
@David: “What about a 1 C change since 1950″
How about just under 0.3C since 1940:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1940/to:2011
LLAP says:
How about just under 0.3C since 1940:
How about you learn some statistics? The linear trend of the HadCRUT3 anomalies from 1/1940 to 9/2011 is +0.087 +/- 0.003 C/decade (r^2=0.56).
@David: “PS: Now that I know your past comments weren’t serious, I won’t waste my time on your future ones.”
Forget so soon?
“How about you learn some statistics?”
I took two courses in 3rd year stats in univeristy, you arrogant prick. The 0.3C difference is between the beginning and end of the time frame I referenced. You claimed 1C of warming since 1950. I called horseshit and you couldn’t even be bothered to back it up. You are so lame.
David, I’d be careful using the isotope signature theory. It hasn’t proven anything other than there are CO2 molecules with different isotope ratios. Tell me, if I breath in CO2 exhaust from a car and then exhale it, what is the isotope ratio of the CO2 molecule? What is the isotope ratio of a decayed plant in an urban setting?
Try this exercise: Cool water proliferated with CO2 to 40 degrees, then heat it to 60 degrees. Where did the CO2 go? Warm water (in the case of interest, specifically warm sea water) outgases CO2, where cool water absorbs it.
I’m not saying one or the other is correct or incorrect, only there’s plenty to think of before anyone can proclaim anything in this regard. Doesn’t it bother you that our emissions and the increase of atmospheric CO2 don’t equate?
Compare the CO2 and temp changes from 1600 to about 1750. You’ll get the same temp slope using anecdotal evidence. Heck, you can even use the magical tree rings to show this (if you believe in such tripe). Two out of three tree rings agree! http://www.real-science.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/HidingTheDecline.gif
Doesn’t it bother you that our emissions and the increase of atmospheric CO2 don’t equate?
No. Who ever said they should be equal?
(Did you know that sea water contains CO2?)
suyts wrote:
Compare the CO2 and temp changes from 1600 to about 1750. You’ll get the same temp slope using anecdotal evidence.
So what? Climate changes, but not always for the same reasons, and not always with the same future.
Do you people really think all these little objections never occurred to anyone before and you’re digging big holes in a science that has been studied for over a century by thousands of very smart people?
Or are you just trying to reassure yourself that your ideology is right?
Bull shit artist David Appell says that I have been misled. I have not been misled. This borders on insult.
I’m new here, but I’ve seen Appell’s prolific postings at a number of other skeptic sites. I’m not sure if that’s really called for. He should stick with his own. And maybe he should be blackballed, honestly.
David was much funnier when he used to do stand up. But I guess it is only natural for a zealot to panic as their church collapses under its own corruption.
“The consensus is Jaworowski was wrong.”
Amen.
What a moron.
We have to make sure the agw edifice fully collapses. And burn the cinders. Or it will rise again, with a new call and a new reason for global socialist justice + deindustrialization.
“Or it will rise again, with a new call and a new reason for global socialist justice + deindustrialization.”
You can pretty much bet the farm that once AGW fades away, the next thing will be the biodiversity crisis. It is already being talked about. I hope I am wrong, but these guys are like the villians in horror films. No matter how many times you kill and bury them, they always seem to come back to life, looking to exact revenge.
I never was a believer, though I’m sceptical by nature of what I read see and hear. I was seeing more frequent reports detailing the horrors to come from “global warming”, and the needle of my BS detector began to register a reading. I started with Google searches, and found myself locked in a “web” of interconnected sites and blogs., and I soon began to realise that there wasn’t actually any debate going on. It was all mutual reinforcement and back-slapping, and no questioning of anything which “proved” anthropogenic global warming and its consequences. I was trapped in Warmingland – like Wonderland but with less logic and common-sense than the Mad Hatter’s tea party.
I found it impossible to actually find any data or convincing scientific reports. Articles and posts linked to other articles and posts in circles. I eventually found that an organisation called the IPCC had produced a definitive report (AR3) which had analysed and summarised all the science. With an open mind I delved within and soon found that the summaries didn’t actually summarise what they claimed to. The main body was indeed scientific, though seemed overly pessimistic, but the summaries had an obvious agenda – a political agenda. Thus was born a Global Warming sceptic.
I remember when I sort of believed the hype.
At first I thought they were talking about waste heat, and I started to get upset about air conditioning.
Then I realized the focus was on CO2 and I felt short of breath.
The modeling did it in for me. Over time I realized that what they were saying did not match reality.
I looked a few things up and found out that those things were not considered important. ( clouds, sunspots, Cosmic rays, Volcanoes)
I wondered if modeling the climate with present day technology was possible.
I decided that it was not.
I found that even though up and down cycles are startlingly evident in the climate history that the concept that the inexorable warming could take a downturn was not
considered at all.
And then the hype language of everything being “Carbon” grated, and the concept of trading smoke coupons really just de-elevated the whole scheme into a scam in my eyes, and I just don’t believe anything these charlatans and hacks say anymore, and the quicker the scientific community realizes this and purges their ranks of these so-called climatologists, the better for the state of general knowledge on the planet.
“David Appell says:
November 22, 2011 at 6:10 am
Gator wrote:
Professor Zbigniew Jaworowski states…
The consensus is that Jaworowski was wrong.”
What an uber utter ass.