"Climate Gate" Debunked

[Perpetual Change]

Thanks to the wallets of the Koch brothers, ironically. Now what will the climate-change deniers turn to?

Back in 2010, Richard Muller, a Berkeley physicist and self-proclaimed climate skeptic, decided to launch the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature (BEST) project to review the temperature data that underpinned global-warming claims. Remember, this was not long after the Climategate affair had erupted, at a time when skeptics were griping that climatologists had based their claims on faulty temperature data.

 Muller’s stated aims were simple. He and his team would scour and re-analyze the climate data, putting all their calculations and methods online. Skeptics cheered the effort. “I’m prepared to accept whatever result they produce, even if it proves my premise wrong,” wrote Anthony Watts, a blogger who has criticized the quality of the weather stations in the United Statse that provide temperature data. The Charles G. Koch Foundation even gave Muller’s project $150,000 — and the Koch brothers, recall, are hardly fans of mainstream climate science.

So what are the end results? Muller’s team appears to have confirmed the basic tenets of climate science. Back in March, Muller told the House Science and Technology Committee that, contrary to what he expected, the existing temperature data was “excellent.” He went on: “We see a global warming trend that is very similar to that previously reported by the other groups.” And, today, the BEST team has released a flurry of new papers that confirm that the planet is getting hotter. As the team’s two-page summary flatly concludes, “Global warming is real.”Here’s a chart comparing their findings with existing data:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/a-skeptical-physicist-ends-up-confirming-climate-data/2011/10/20/gIQA6viC1L_blog.html

[El JoNNo]

lolclimatechangedenialist

[GuineaPig]

Not really a surprise.  All the institutions involved were previously cleared of wrongdoing, and it's pretty obvious the planet is warming, and it's cause.

[Super Dude]

Not really a surprise.  All the institutions involved were previously cleared of wrongdoing, and it's pretty obvious the planet is warming, and it's cause.

Not to most; we have our fair share of skeptics on this board, and even a lot that believe global warming is happening but not from anthropogenic sources.

[GuineaPig]

I mean, if you look at the facts on the ground, it should be obvious.  It's not a complex thing to understand.

[Chino]

I don't understand why it is so hard to grasp the concept an atmosphere rich in cardon dioxide will result in higher temperature. The sun's rays are absorbed by the Earth, and as it cools it releases this heat as radiant heat. Carbon dioxide is very good at absorbing and storing radiant heat. It's no coincidence that Venus' atmopsphere, which holds something like 80 times more greenhouse gases, results in a surface temperature in access of 800 degrees. It's also no coincidence that Mars' lack of an atmosphere results in temperatures (at the equator) of about 1 degree and drops to -150 at night.

[GuineaPig]

Fun fact: if you removed all of the greenhouse gases from Earth and Venus' atmospheres, Earth would be warmer than Venus, despite Venus being ~435 degrees K hotter than the Earth.

[antigoon]

If only Obama would use his self-granted extra judicial assassination powers on a real menace...the Koch Brothers. 

[Chino]

Fun fact: if you removed all of the greenhouse gases from Earth and Venus' atmospheres, Earth would be warmer than Venus, despite Venus being ~435 degrees K hotter than the Earth.

How do you figure? Do you mean like the moment you removed the atmospere, or even after millions of years?

[Super Dude]

Just as greenhouse gases trap heat, GHG such as CO2 are also the reason the Earth doesn't instantly burst into flames. Weird, right?

[GuineaPig]

Fun fact: if you removed all of the greenhouse gases from Earth and Venus' atmospheres, Earth would be warmer than Venus, despite Venus being ~435 degrees K hotter than the Earth.

How do you figure? Do you mean like the moment you removed the atmospere, or even after millions of years?

It's just the influence of each planet's greenhouse gases on their respective surface temperatures.  So in a hypothetical scenario where all the greenhouse gases were removed from the atmospheres of both, Venus would be colder (~-45 C) than the Earth (~-18 C).

[Scheavo]

Now to see how the climate skeptics spin, or try to.

[snapple]

Spin it? No.

One more scientist doesn't mean the skeptics beliefs have been debunked.

[Super Dude]

It's not just one scientist, dude...

[snapple]

It's not just one scientist, dude...

The wine has been good to me tonight. I really didn't read the whole article.

[Scheavo]

One more scientist doesn't mean the skeptics beliefs have been debunked.

So a skeptical scientist, who goes in, does his own research, and is swayed by the evidence, means nothing to you?

Obviously nothing will satisfy you.

[rumborak]

Climate change denial, for the most part, has very little to do with reason.  It's really more of a political movement.

rumborak

[snapple]

Climate change denial, for the most part, has very little to do with reason.  It's really more of a political movement.

rumborak

I don't feel the need to explain why I don't agree with climate change? It's not like it is going to sway anyone's opinion here anyway?

[jasc15]

Fun fact: if you removed all of the greenhouse gases from Earth and Venus' atmospheres, Earth would be warmer than Venus, despite Venus being ~435 degrees K hotter than the Earth.

How so?  Venus is about 40% closer to the sun than Earth is, making its solar radiation roughly double what it is on Earth.

[GuineaPig]

Fun fact: if you removed all of the greenhouse gases from Earth and Venus' atmospheres, Earth would be warmer than Venus, despite Venus being ~435 degrees K hotter than the Earth.

How so?  Venus is about 40% closer to the sun than Earth is, making its solar radiation roughly double what it is on Earth.

Yep.  But solar radiation is just one part of the energy budget.  Venus' higher albedo and lack of liquid water means that its temperature would be lower if the greenhouse effect were hypothetically removed (although it would then adjust).  It's just an interesting factoid that shows that the greenhouse effect is pretty important to the temperature of a planet.

[jasc15]

Fun fact: if you removed all of the greenhouse gases from Earth and Venus' atmospheres, Earth would be warmer than Venus, despite Venus being ~435 degrees K hotter than the Earth.

How so?  Venus is about 40% closer to the sun than Earth is, making its solar radiation roughly double what it is on Earth.

Yep.  But solar radiation is just one part of the energy budget.  Venus' higher albedo and lack of liquid water means that its temperature would be lower if the greenhouse effect were hypothetically removed (although it would then adjust).  It's just an interesting factoid that shows that the greenhouse effect is pretty important to the temperature of a planet.

Ah, albedo.  I saw a few different methods of measurement for it which had varying values for Venus so I wasnt sure how to use that number.

[jsem]

Climate change denial, for the most part, has very little to do with reason.  It's really more of a political movement.

rumborak

I don't feel the need to explain why I don't agree with climate change? It's not like it is going to sway anyone's opinion here anyway?

Please do explain yourself though. Empirical evidence doesn't seem to be in your favor to be honest.

[El JoNNo]

Climate change denial, for the most part, has very little to do with reason.  It's really more of a political movement.

rumborak

I don't feel the need to explain why I don't agree with climate change? It's not like it is going to sway anyone's opinion here anyway?

Of course it won't, it's not really a rational position. Giving the overwhelming evidence for it.

[snapple]

I'm not always a rational person. 

I guess because I live in Michigan and its been hella cold here the last 4 or 5 years. Like, record LOWS.

[GuineaPig]

While Michigan may have established record low temperatures over the last several years, the world has most definitely been warmer than average:








With 2010 being the warmest year on record.

[snapple]

I live in the pinky of Michigan. We're surrounded by lakes. this summer, we had a one week period of 90+ degree weather. Last summer, I don't think it cracked 91.

I think the sample size (in years) of measuring the Earth's temperature is too small. Especially on a geological timeline. I think about it as a baseball player with only 20 ABs. Oh, they hit 10/20 ABs? While impressive, they may mean they're just on a hot streak. Conversely, if they're 3/20, they could just be in a cold spell. When you get hundreds of ABs during a season, you can't judge a player on just 20.

[El JoNNo]

You know we can measure the temperature for the last 2 billion years or so, right?

[GuineaPig]

I don't know why sample size particularly matters.  We can measure all the big influences on our climate.  We know we're amplifying the greenhouse effect.  We know this is resulting in an increase in temperature.

EDIT: Though I suppose it is useful to know that the general cycle (Milankovitch Cycles) take place over ~100,000 years.

[Super Dude]

Snapple, as a fellow Michigander living a good deal south of you, I can tell ya global warming is happening here. As a kid, snow used to come in November. If memory serves, this is the first snow we've had before January in nearly a decade, least where I'm at.

[73109]

I find it somewhat funny that "because it's not hot here" is a reason someone can deny global warming. To me, it's analogous to denying evolution "because I can't see monkey's evolving in zoos."

[eric42434224]

Snapple, as a fellow Michigander living a good deal south of you, I can tell ya global warming is happening here. As a kid, snow used to come in November. If memory serves, this is the first snow we've had before January in nearly a decade, least where I'm at.

But by your reasoning, isnt global warming over?

[Super Dude]

Global warming hasn't even really started yet. But no, I was just showing how regional differences are no indication.

[Scheavo]

I live in the pinky of Michigan. We're surrounded by lakes. this summer, we had a one week period of 90+ degree weather. Last summer, I don't think it cracked 91.

I think the sample size (in years) of measuring the Earth's temperature is too small. Especially on a geological timeline. I think about it as a baseball player with only 20 ABs. Oh, they hit 10/20 ABs? While impressive, they may mean they're just on a hot streak. Conversely, if they're 3/20, they could just be in a cold spell. When you get hundreds of ABs during a season, you can't judge a player on just 20.

I like how you say the sample size is too small, but then you take your own experience as proof (where your own experiences are a woefully small sample size)

[snapple]

I live in the pinky of Michigan. We're surrounded by lakes. this summer, we had a one week period of 90+ degree weather. Last summer, I don't think it cracked 91.

I think the sample size (in years) of measuring the Earth's temperature is too small. Especially on a geological timeline. I think about it as a baseball player with only 20 ABs. Oh, they hit 10/20 ABs? While impressive, they may mean they're just on a hot streak. Conversely, if they're 3/20, they could just be in a cold spell. When you get hundreds of ABs during a season, you can't judge a player on just 20.

I like how you say the sample size is too small, but then you take your own experience as proof (where your own experiences are a woefully small sample size)

1st part was saying that the temperature didn't really rise in my area over the last few years.

2nd part was about sample size.

3rd part is global warming isn't that big of a deal to me.

[Super Dude]

How old are you, snapple? If you're comfortable sharing that information.