7 January 2014
No, Just Because It’s Really Cold In The Eastern U.S., All That Science Is Not Wrong
Posted by Dan Satterfield
What does claiming this blast of Arctic air disproves climate change show? The same thing that claiming researchers who got trapped in an ice flow in Antarctica does: that your critical thinking skills are in need of serious improvement! My normal response to questions about it is that we do not measure the temperature of the planet in (insert your town here). One can also point out that this past November was the warmest one globally on record.
Actually, it’s very telling that these kind of claims are the best that those who are skeptical of the science can come up with. Perhaps (it’s) why newspapers and magazines are increasingly banning letters from them. What we do about climate change is a fair political question, but if you want to prove the science wrong, submit your scientific evidence to a peer-reviewed journal. As my fave quote from Neil De Grasse Tyson goes: “The laws of physics are real, everything else is just politics”.
A couple of good reads about the subject. One HERE in the Washington Post. My friend Bob Henson at the National Center for Atmospheric Research has a very good perspective on this cold, and how it relates to the past and climate change as well. Jason Samenow from the Capital Weather Gang at the Washington Post also explained why it got so cold on NPR’s All Thing’s Considered. It seems that a common meteorological term “Polar Vortex” has been discovered by the public this week!
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I sense your frustration, but there is still a lot even the most experience such as yourself can’t know or predict even with the most significant models and simulations. Mother nature for all intensive purposes has a way of say causing storms like Sandy that even though we predicted very well was completely strange. There are two camps to this Global Warming with the only unifier being that in recent years the Earth has warmed overall. The one I am apart of and from my discussions and per review article read is that we can’t take the time since the discovery of fossil fuels and automatically blame humans for all the problems of our planet, and when investigating climate you look at all of time not just recent years. Not to belittle the human contribution but the earth system as a whole can not be discredited. The other camp that I’ve seen from again reading plenty of papers and listening to the likes of Al Gore (whose not at all a credible source) and climatologists is that humans point blank are a scourge to the planet and have caused all the wrong and ill to befall it. Basically when people claim that we scientists ALL (100%) believe global warming is caused by ONLY humans use of fossil fuels is an opinion some believe it is a natural evolution that is affecting in part by humans but controlled mostly by cycles (ex. inter glacial cycles).
Your quote of Tyson is valid but peoples “opinions” cloud scientific thought and color any data collected your possible refutation that we have per review etc. to balance that doesn’t fix it opinion is what drives every humans actions. I am and avid follower of all the pop physics people and if you remember a great man named Carl Sagan who advocated the complete understanding of our world before all else. He famously liked the Science fiction topic of Tera-forming but said in order for us to be able to live amongst the stars we have to learn how to control our current environment (I believe this was from Pale Blue Dot).
We can’t say that defacto something exists and claim to know the cause of it when after all these years of Atmospheric Science we can only make a credible 7-10 day forecast. Nobody knows that without humans this warming trend wouldn’t have happened naturally and for all intensive purposes climate change is to weather as string theory and god particles is to physics. People think our jobs revolve around crystal ball’s and lucky guessing (even though they don’t) but you expect them to believe 100% that we know humans caused the Earth to warm cut people some slack not everyone lives and breathes scientific journals and news is all they have. Stating that their critical thinking skills are in need of improvement is harsh. In short science is about discovery and without peoples opinions and debate we would not be were we are today. When people try to say that a polar vortex means global warming isn’t real you educate them and send them on there way towards the nearest library or computer you don’t belittle them. Didn’t you give a speech on scientific communication I watched it and enjoyed it (along with shared it with all my friends) but reading this blog post throws all you said out the window sir and out of respect I feel your better than that.
I was thinking of the basic law – for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. We’ve introduced a long lived molecule with strong radiative properties in massive quantities into the atmosphere while removing valuable carbon sinks like the rain forests to name one. There haven’t been any changes in other components of the Earth system to account for the changes we see, including solar activity. Man is clearly the cause.
Paleo-records alone should convince everyone regardless of your confidence in the models. I’m no expert on modeling, but it’s my understanding that they have a better grasp of cloud behavior now. However, they do appear to have issues – they keep understating the timing and scale of impacts – e.g. the Arctic. They can barely keep with real time events, and that is a grave concern of mine.
The IPCC does not do research but acts as a publisher’s clearing house for previously published journal papers. I don’t like the process because of the power that governments have on what is included in the report. In fact, a lot of state’s whose wealth is built on oil would object to the information, but maybe I too have Libertarian instincts. Have you checked the web sites of the individual organizations? From what I can see, there is a lot on line.
The conversation has shifted again, Dan. Rush claims scientists made up the vortex as per this transcript:
RUSH: “So, ladies and gentlemen, we are having a record-breaking cold snap in many parts of the country. And right on schedule the media have to come up with a way to make it sound like it’s completely unprecedented. Because they’ve got to find a way to attach this to the global warming agenda, and they have. It’s called the “polar vortex.” The dreaded polar vortex.
Do you know what the polar vortex is? Have you ever heard of it? Well, they just created it for this week.”…
And then he later says:
“the key to all this is you have to understand one of the fundamental concepts of man-made global warming is ice melting at the poles. One of the ways they have always sought to convince you that the world is warming is not the climate where you live, but rather where you aren’t, where you can’t see what is really happening. So they tell you the ice is melting at the North Pole and the South Pole. And then they publish pictures, which are fraudulent pictures of poor little polar bears stranded on three square feet of ice that you are told used to be the North Pole.”
And, to think a lot of people listen to him, like my dreaded in-laws! Thanks.
I wonder what that term called a Polar Vortex that I learned in 1977 was then. It’s scary that so many people listen to that poppycock. A mind is indeed a terrible thing to waste.
Here in western PA and also western NY, Rush has a following with professionals that include doctors, lawyers, teachers, engineers and clerics. In fact, his show used to play in the corporate offices of an international environmental consulting firm where I worked. I didn’t stay long.
I doubt these listeners wasted their mind through lack of education, but rather these otherwise bright and intelligent listeners may have been born with those paranoid leanings. Rush simply re-enforces those leanings.
And, thanks for the response. It’s nice to be heard after debating/arguing at length with the climate dragon deniers, like Rush.
It amazes me how some people’s world view will blind them to overwhelming evidence on any subject that does not fit within it. This reminds me of another quote by NDT- The great thing about science is that it it’s true, whether or not not you believe it. If you understand science and it’s methods you will realize the truth in that statement.
I too remember how things were when at college. I did a senior paper on permafrost soils, histosols and arctic methane for a soil tax class in the early 80s. When I started to hear about thawing a few years ago, I did some additional research, including a review of recent papers, buying the 1960s book :The Canadian Arctic by Air” and another about building the Alaskan Highway during WW2. Things are much different up there, including the much reported methane vents along Siberia which used to be capped.
I can’t help but be concerned then when I read other scientific papers that say the vents may have been there for 1000s of years, and by inference, everything is A OK. That indeed maybe the case, but they fail to point out that there used to be a lid on it and that temperatures continue to warm at an accelerating pace up there. The rate of expansion is tremendous and had they been there in the past, I think the explorers or our Navy would have noted it during all those cold war exercises up there.
So I know your busy, but next time you run into a methane denialist, like Drs. Alley or Archer, set them straight. A mind is a terrible thing to waste, and sometimes it needs to be forced to look at reality through pressure from peers.
http://a-sceptical-mind.com/a-drop-of-sewage-or-a-drop-of-wine
http://a-sceptical-mind.com/the-solar-hypothesis-a-video-lecture
I do not think the media we listen to on either side has the answer but they sway the minds of non scientists. Rush is on an extreme conservative wing and he fails to see any science that being said I’m a Libertarian conservative and listen to him when in comes to politics. Oh and I was in the car when he said that and it drove me crazy even as a skeptic blatant disregard for common scientific principles is wrong and truly has very little connect to the unprecedented rate change debate. thanks for finding the quote Jack
The links above are to one website that shares videos from more credible sources. I have yet to find a free version of the CLOUD projects paper but along with the Snow Albedo Temperature Feedback, how clouds affect climate, and just the lack of open sourced data for models other than the ones controlled by IPCC we just can’t say with certainty that humans are the only source and when everyone has access to models and can do the science themselves we might find some more answers than currently available.
FYI People were totally against Einstein when he had an opposing theory and even now people are trying to prove him wrong. Everyone is entitled to their opinions and your right science is truth. BUT in science Laws are the only concrete truth Theories are torn apart and changed and debated and everything else I see now laws of climate change other than the Earth’s climate has changed since it was a molten ball of lava and it will keep doing so long after we leave but I think that’s more common knowledge and really doesn’t need to be law. (and or until the sun becomes a red super giant and swallows us up either one)
http://a-sceptical-mind.com/a-drop-of-sewage-or-a-drop-of-wine
http://a-sceptical-mind.com/the-solar-hypothesis-a-video-lecture
I do not think the media we listen to on either side has the answer but they sway the minds of non scientists. Rush is on an extreme conservative wing and he fails to see any science that being said I’m a Libertarian conservative and listen to him when in comes to politics. Oh and I was in the car when he said that and it drove me crazy even as a skeptic blatant disregard for common scientific principles is wrong and truly has very little connect to the unprecedented rate change debate. thanks for finding the quote Jack
The links above are to one website that shares videos from more credible sources. I have yet to find a free version of the CLOUD projects paper but along with the Snow Albedo Temperature Feedback, how clouds affect climate, and just the lack of open sourced data for models other than the ones controlled by IPCC we just can’t say with certainty that humans are the only source and when everyone has access to models and can do the science themselves we might find some more answers than currently available.
FYI People were totally against Einstein when he had an opposing theory and even now people are trying to prove him wrong. Everyone is entitled to their opinions and your right science is truth. BUT in science Laws are the only concrete truth Theories are torn apart and changed and debated and everything else I see now laws of climate change other than the Earth’s climate has changed since it was a molten ball of lava and it will keep doing so long after we leave but I think that’s more common knowledge and really doesn’t need to be law. (and or until the sun becomes a red super giant and swallows us up either one)
Before speculating on what Einstein believed or didn’t, it would be good to review the history. Best author on that peruid in science is IMO Thomas Kuhn with his Blackbody Theory and the Quantum Discontinuity, 1894-1912, and Structure of Scientific Revolutions.
Also, please note, Einstein turned out to be quite wrong about Quantum Mechanics, disliking “Spooky action at a distance” or quantum entanglement as he put it.
Another relevant book is Feynman’s The Character of Physical Law.
there’s a typo: “What we about climate change is a fair political question”
thnx- it’s fixed!
“Perhaps why newspapers and magazines are…”
Another missing word?
Well kinda, I put it back in in parenthesis! š
Clearly the LOTA map provides insight to temperature anomalies occurring in the northern hemisphere. Regions which are traditionally colder year round are experiencing long term warming trends (Eurasia and northern Alaska). To Jack Wolfe: thanks for posting that tidbit, it’s truly a sad that any American would rely on Rush for scientific news, discoveries or discussion.
I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they
can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great
point is to bring them the real facts.”
— Abraham Lincoln
Here is another tid bit: When the Reddit news site banned comments from deniers, they found that some of those deniers have multiple identities – up to 20. I also heard of up to 70 on another site. All that chatter may be nothing more that one person.
And, since the ban, they also found conversation has become civil again with far fewer insults being thrown (on both sides).
Agree with the post. Only about the quote from Neil De Grasse Tyson, “āThe laws of physics are real, everything else is just politicsā…
IĀ“d rather think that *everything* is politics, even the (so-called) “laws” of Physics… The vision of “laws” in science is probably an old vision. “Laws” are human artifacts. All we can talk about is “current” knowledge, which may (and sure will) be modified in future.
No, with climate change, it is only climate policy that is political. Physical or scientific laws are determined by nature and are universal. Otherwise, natural phenomena such as gravity would be included in your definition where clearly it is not. Sorry for the following cut and paste, but Oxford says it better than I:
… according to the Oxford English dictionary, physical law “is a theoretical principle deduced from particular facts, applicable to a defined group or class of phenomena, and expressible by the statement that a particular phenomenon always occurs if certain conditions be present. Physical laws are typically conclusions based on repeated scientific experiments and observations over many years and which have become accepted universally within the scientific community
Sounds like MetOffice is attributing Arctic amplification or, at least, deep Jet Stream, per http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24824-us-freeze-is-nothing-to-do-with-a-polar-vortex.html
Extremely badly written article. The Rossby waves have slowed but the jet stream is at near record levels. I saw nearly 200 knots yesterday crossing the Atlantic. Unusually poor writing from New Scientist.
@Jack Wolf,
Regarding “So I know your busy, but next time you run into a methane denialist, like Drs. Alley or Archer, set them straight. A mind is a terrible thing to waste, and sometimes it needs to be forced to look at reality through pressure from peers” and related …
The thing about methane is that while, gram for gram, it has 30x or so greenhouse properties compared with carbon dioxide, (1) its relevant absorption line (around 1270 per cm) is not as close to Earth black body peak as is CO2’s 667 per cm, and (2) its atmospheric lifetime is no more than 20-30 years. What’s most important about methane is that, whatever remains in atmosphere decomposes into CO2 and, in that sense, DOES contribute to the problem.
As I understand it, methane has 20 to 30 times the warming potential of carbon dioxide. The preindustrial global concentration as about 700 ppb and current global levels are about 1800 ppb.
Infrared Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer (IASI) methane levels on January 14, 2014, showed levels as high as 2329 ppb over the Arctic Ocean. These high releases from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean have been showing up persistently since early October 2013.
Furthermore, I recall other methane blooms in the Arctic found by NASA’s CARVE in 2013, not to mention the data recently presented by U. of AK scientists.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ZkxQpd0Pep4/UtfSsBFldNI/AAAAAAAAMhc/LIV50TY_qu0/s1600/Jan-14-2014-4.jpg
Throw in permafrost thaw, and we have issues that can not be ignored or shrugged off.