Ice Core Data

You say you don't need to compare the two data sets, but that is what you are doing. Saying that one shows 4C variation and the other 1C variation is a comparison. A comparison that requires both datasets to be measuring the same thing with sufficient accuracy, which if true means we can graph them together. If they are both reporting changes in degree C then they can be plotted alongside each other. That's just making visual the comparison you are doing in your head afterall.

GISP2 ice core has very high resolution, often less than 10 years between datapoints, not the centuries to millenia that someone earlier claimed (this is clear from looking at the GISP2 graphs above it's clear there are no thousand year gaps between datapoints). So GISP2, if it represents temperature correctly can certainly be graphed alongside and compared with the instrumental record.

"The present warming can only be unprecedented if your time scale is 150 years. The instant you begin to examine the range of natural variability in the system, you bump into 4C real quick."

That's 4C over thousands of years and is part of glacial/interglacial cycles due to orbital changes amplified by greenhouse gases. Scientists can explain it and it has been modeled using the same physics that shows human greenhouse gas emissions today are warming the planet.

 

All predictions are speculative. By using the term "speculative" the authors are just acknowledging that fact. Using the term speculative does not negate the outcome of their models.

I've already addressed this. This paper is not the definitive research on natural variability. As shown in a previous post, the authors even acknowledge this.
From the introduction
"However, the Greenland temperature trend diverges from the global trend in the last 168 years, which raises the possibility that much of the trend is due to natural variability, and makes it more difficult to attribute the recent warming in Greenland to increasing anthropogenic greenhouse gases in the atmosphere [Box et al., 2009; Chylek et al., 2006, 2010]. For example, according to observed temperature records, Greenland underwent a 33% larger warming in 1919–1932 than the warming in 1994–2007 [Box et al., 2009], and recent decadal average temperature is similar to that of the 1930s–1940s [Chylek et al., 2006; Box et al., 2009]. A deviation of the Greenland temperature from the global average temperature trend is likely caused by regional climate variability via modes such as the North Atlantic Oscillation/Arctic Oscillation (NAO/AO) and the Atlantic Multi‐decadal Oscillation (AMO) [Hanna et al., 2008; Long, 2009; Chylek et al., 2010]. These twentieth century oscillations are thought to be induced by the internal variability of climate system [Ting et al., 2009]. As our
understanding of climate variability is limited by relatively short observational records, it is critical to develop a longer precise temperature record with tight age control."

This paper does not address global warming; it addresses only Greenland temperature trends. For you to suggest otherwise shows either your dishonesty or your misunderstanding of the paper.

 

And I should believe you because .......?

Can you give me an example of this technology? Can you explain how this technology will allow us to grow crops in drought-stricken areas caused by climate change? Can you explain how this technology will allow us to grow crops in flooded areas caused by climate change?

Being "unprecedented" is just a gauge of the changes being brought about by climate change. The actual effects, (high temperatures, acidification of the oceans, melting sea ice, droughts, flooding), is the evidence of extreme climate change.

 

I engage my common sense and look at the available facts before falling for media soundbites

Can you explain how you know these catastrophes are going to happen and will be caused by us

Says who ?

 

What . Models like these you mean ?

http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/CMIP5-73-models-vs-obs-20N-20S-MT-5-yr-means1.png

Given they've got it so dramatically wrong in under 40 years why are you prepared to believe thier predictions over the next 90 ?

I selected the most important line of the paragraph you selected

I wish you environmentalists would make up your minds here. Either what is happening in the Arctic is or is not critical to our thinking on climate change. You cant have it both ways when you suddenly find the facts contradict the hypothesis

 

And I was confused about adapting to a 1-2C change in temperature when obviously humans were kicking around at the end of the last ice age when it was cold, and somehow manage to survive in everything from deserts to tundra to the Arctic. If humans have demonstrated anything, it is we can adapt to temperatures ranging from -20C to +45C. Humidity? Rain forest versus desert? Beach versus forest? Sure...what has apparently given you the impression that we can't adapt to changes in environment?

Baloney. New York has done quite fine in the changing environment claimed to have started back in the 1800's. They are still there, and they are still fed, so obviously they have the resources to feed themselves.

More horse puckey. Of course humans can MOVE a city, the question is, is that the best solution to the problem of having built too close to an ocean? Certainly you don't get to postulate that just becaue it is hard, it can't be done. Of course it can be done, it isn't impossible just because it is expensive or a pain in the butt. And "rapidly" is relative, and mostly irrelevant, New York has not only accomplished adapting ALREADY to the past century and a half, but "rapid" has happened before, and if humans are too stupid to have learned from the past, they don't get to complain about how unfair it is now. They should have asked some questions of scientists who already knew that sea levels rise (and fall) and that glaciers once sat on top of NYC and might again. Certainly THERE is a consequence of natural climate change humans should pay attention to.

History is never irrelevant. History shows us the possible scale of natural variability, and how the climate adapted to those changes, and how humans adapted to those, and what that meant to the various flora and fauna besides humans. And while a fascination with current trends is an interesting endeavor, you don't even know if it is abnormal without that same history. Which is my entire point. Without knowing what is abnormal naturally, you can't claim that what has happened in the past century and a half is any different than what has happened before. Period. And the ice core data doesn't say the world is warming since the last ice age, it says it is cooling. When your claim is time scale dependent, you don't get to pretend that you know the world is warming any more than I know it is cooling. We both can make the claim, it looks mutually exclusive, but it is not.

 

But not the way your graph did it. You see, either the methods for determining temperature are reasonable, or they are not. If they are not, then you throw out all of the ice core data, or all of the instrument record. What I count on is EACH being reasonable when compared to themselves. Not each other. So yes, I can say "this model indicates 4C of change when measured the same way by the same people from the same core", and I could say the same thing about the instrument record. And then I compare only the change from each to the other. Are you saying that the instrument record cannot measure change using only the instrument records? Or that the ice core data can't measure the difference between temperatures either?

To date, you are the ONLY person I've seen claim that. Do you have a reference to others who claim that this is easy-peazy?

Scientists cannot predict past temperature changes. Therefore their claims of "understanding" how to predict temperature in reference to greenhouse gases is obviously invalid. If they understood, they could predict. They cannot predict even the KNOWN, therefore they do not understand.

They appear to think they understand the general cycles, the sun does this, temperature trends this way or that in a predictable manner. But those temperature changes are not perfectly cyclical, they do not follow the same path, they are interrupted for reasons not understood, and then vary wildly, etc etc. So sure, GENERALLY we know which way the temperature should be going....with an error bar based on natural variability of perhaps 4C.

 

Oh please, talk about strawmen. Warmer air holds more moisture, can you please explain how more moisture in the air leads to less water then falling on the ground somewhere? Your assumption that climate change can only lead to drought is ridiculous, the drought argument is just as silly as confusing weather with climate. Worse maybe.

The "more energy in the atmoshere" argument works better than this one, and as the ice core data shows, in our currently cooler world, our storms nowadays probably have NOTHING over those bad mamma jamma's back a few thousand years ago when the planet was warmer.

Oh please, now instead of climate change causing drought it causes floods? Make up your mind already! And the answer to this one is easy...we grow crops another way. It is called vertical farming. Doesn't even need new technology, why does everyone think you need new technology when old technology and getting the stupid humans out of the way is all it takes?

No it isn't. Unprecedented wasn't even the glaciers melting off of New York City, that had happened before as well. We aren't even at 1/4 the temperature changes possible naturally since the last ice age, so "unprecedented" is nothing but a modifier designed to scare people into compliance. It is what the climate change gang is all about. Unprecedented! (except for what happened before the end of the LIA)! Warmest! (except for what happened before the end of the LIA)! Worst! (as long as you ignore all the other worsts).

It plays to the goldfish like attention span of most humans.

Baloney. Again. Because 1/4 of the natural temperature variability isn't extreme. Give it another 3C, then we can talk...about matching what has happened in the past 15,000 years or so. And don't even get me started on the Cretaceous!

 

“Common sense is what tells us the earth is flat.”

― Albert Einstein
Rather appropriate for the pseudo-scientists.

So you have no answers to legitimate questions?!. I thought as much. I've danced this dance before with other "skeptics". If you want a discussion answer questions. If you want to rant, go for it; but I will call you out on the misinformation.

Ridicule, conspiracy theories, strawman arguments and Lies is all "skeptics" have left because reality is getting harder and harder to deny.

 

Must be engraved over the office door of Mann then.

 

I believe you are very much mistaken and are confusing the resolution at the very top of the core with the resolution throughout. After all your post suggusts that you think an ice core's resolution is constant which is profoundly ignorant.

 

Sure. Dams, canals and pipelines.

Of course. Dams, canals and pipelines allow us to transport excess water from where it falls to where it's wanted.

Yep. Dams, canals and pipelines allow us to direct excess water away from areas where there is already too much water, to areas where there is not enough.

No, it's a claim of climate change having exceeded the limits of natural variability, and wrt recent climate change, it is indisputably a bald lie.

Nope. The fact that none of those is actually that big a deal is much better evidence that climate change is not extreme.

 

Whoah there its your position with all the questions to answer ! You guys are the ones claiming that the sky is falling and that its all our fault. Dont take a hissy fit because some of us ask to see the evidence for that before blindly donning your hair shirt

 

From your history of calling anyone that disagrees with you a liar, whenever you use the "L" word in a post, I ignore that post. Try again.

 

Ridicule, conspiracy theories, strawman arguments and Lies is all "skeptics" have left because reality is getting harder and harder to deny.

Where did I state "climate change can only lead to drought"? Changing climate disturbs weather patterns which create drought in some areas and floods in other areas.
Speaking of floods: Floods in 2013:
Davenport, IA


Germany, Poland, Austria, Czech Republic

Northern India

China

Calgary

Queensland

Show me another year where so many floods have occurred!

A few thousand years ago, climate change was not caused by human release of sequestered FFs. Current warming is.

Yes, droughts and floods can occur at the same on on different parts of the globe.

Natural variability is not extreme. The effects of a changing climate is extreme weather.
And one more time: it's not the temperature variability but the extreme rate of change that is problematic. Show me anywhere in the past 15,000 years that the rate of change has been as extreme as what is happening now.

 

So make up your mind; do you accept the paper you linked to or not?
So are you stating all models are wrong? That's quite a stretch of logic. "Doctor Jones misdiagnosed my illness so now I'm going to reject the diagnoses of all doctors".

Yes, you quoted the line that confirms your bias and ignored the rest of the study.

Yes, what happens in the Arctic is critical to climate change. But regional variations, even in the Arctic, do not define climate change.

 

You didn't say "only". You said that climate change causes drought.

Sure. As soon as you come up with a measure of flood occurrence (after you define "flood" of course) going back through the warm periods of the planet since the last ice age. Certainly it makes no more sense talking about current flood occurrence than it does current temperatures without a reference longer than just the last century of so, a few seconds of geologic time. Doing that leaves out the occurrence of floods during the REAL big swings in temperature the planet was experiencing during the past 3 or 4 warming periods. For all you know, Noah built the Ark for a damn good reason.

You don't know what current warming is caused by because you don't know what the variability in the system is. And currently the world is trending cooler, each successive warming period cooler than the last. So "current warming" only can be claimed by the myopic.

Natural variability can run 4C from a cool period to the peak of a warm one. Compared to the small amount of warming claimed since the last cool period, we ain't even halfway their yet. See how well knowing a little history can lend perspective?

Then buckle up, because Mommy Nature might have another 3C in store for us!

You can't compare data sets that way, because the resolution of the ice cores can't go down that small. So all you can say is the same nonsense you say about floods..."gee, what we are seeing the past century of so is really different than <fill in grandiose claim based on only a centuries observations>!"

History matters. And knowing that you are only relying on the past century or so for yours means you need more perspective. Certainly Easterbrook makes some interesting claims on rate of change, and he is probably more qualified to do so than you and I.

Something melted those ice sheets and THAT one I will give you is an impressive consequence of temperature change. Some floods and droughts? What a joke. 12C!!! Bring it on Mommy Nature!

"About 15,000 years ago, a sudden, intense, climatic warming of about 21°F (~12° C caused dramatic melting of the large ice sheets that covered Canada and the northern U.S., all of Scandinavia, and much of northern Europe and Russia."

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/01/24/easterbrook-on-the-magnitude-of-greenland-gisp2-ice-core-data/

 

Yes I accept todays Arctic temperatures are well within natural variation of the last 4000 years based on level and rate of change. Do you ?

I didnt just state they are wrong I can graphically illustrate they are. Not just one or two of them either but ALL of them. Speculation based on them is therefore utterly worthless. This for the second time ....

http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/CMIP5-73-models-vs-obs-20N-20S-MT-5-yr-means1.png

http://www.drroyspencer.com/2013/06...-models-vs-measurements-running-5-year-means/

I must remember that next time the eco mentalists scream bloody murder when a new Arctic low record gets set

 

You and Easterbrook are comparing Greenland temperature changes to global temperature changes. IT is well known that Greenland temperatures changes are larger than the global changes. A 12C change in Greenland temperature does not translate to a 12C global change.
Recent warming in Greenland in a long-term instrumental (1881–2012) climatic context: I. Evaluation of surface air temperature records

Clearly from this study, Greenland warming is NOT representative of global warming so using Easterbrook's global value of 0.8C and comparing it to past warming of Greenland is deceptive.
Easerbrook's graph:

Current warming for Greenland is greater than the 0.8C Easterbrook displays. Winter trends were as high as 10C since 1991. The study doesn't give any numbers for annual warming.
Another deceptive post on Watts' site.

 

There simply is no basis whatsoever for determinig todays temperatures are outwith natural norms and there is a whole load of evidence taken from ice cores at both poles that confirms this.

http://mclean.ch/climate/Ice_cores.htm

About 1,000 years ago average temperatures were about 1 degree higher than today (which makes our concern about an 0.4 degree rise since 1980 rather minor).

About 2,100 years ago average temperatures were about 2 degrees higher than today.

About 3,300 years ago average temperatures were about 3 degrees higher than today. (The data from Greenland ice-cores goes back far beyond this time so, despite what some people say, it looks like it takes a lot more than 3 degrees to melt the ice cap!)

Unless there is some evidence that polar temperatures today somehow have a different relationship to wider global temperatures than they did in the past then this is just more shroud waving frankly

 

I never call anyone a liar. I just identify lies. And only claims that ARE lies.

Do you propose by that means to lie and not be called on it?

 

Ridicule, conspiracy theories, strawman arguments and Lies is all "skeptics" have left because reality is getting harder and harder to deny.

See my previous post about the deceptive practice of translating Greenland warming trends to global trends.

Laws of physics tell us that CO2 absorbs and re-emits LWR. Even the skeptical scientists such as Lindzen, Christy, Spencer accept this fact.
In the last 150 years there has been an approximate 40% increase in the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.
Climate sensitivity at the low end is about 1C according to skeptical scientists; at the high end 4C with most climatologists somewhere in between.
Just these facts suggest that we have a problem with a changing climate. Add to that the evidence of an increase in extreme weather events, an increase in atmospheric and ocean temperatures, a decrease in glacial mass and thickness, a decrease in sea ice and thickness, an increase in sea levels, there is no doubt that the climate is changing and a majority of that change is from releasing sequestered CO2. If just the temperature of Greenland were the only event occurring, then I would agree with the "skeptics"; there's nothing to worry about. But what we have is not just on line of evidence, but multiple evidence all pointing in the same direction.
The laws of Physics and the evidence shows us that the cliamte is changing and humans are the most important factor. What happened 15,000 years ago is irrelevant to what is happening to climate today.

 

Interesting facts. And no one denies that the climate is changing, the glaciers no longer sitting on top of NYC are evidence of this fact. The dispute is whether or not the warming from the depths of the LIA is all, or partially, caused by people. Versus just the same type of temperature reversal which has happened hundreds, if not thousands, of times before.

You can't quantify extreme except in the recent past, therefore you don't know what extreme in weather is any more than natural extreme in temperatures.

Either of which would be completely expected in the temperature rebound from the LIA

All of which has happened pre-recorded history and in some cases on a much more substantial level (where are those glaciers covering NY again?)

Now you pull a rabbit out of your hat. Because you don't know natural variability, you don't know the processes which drove the wild temperature swings in the past, and obviously THAT wasn't from CO2, so until you know how it happens naturally, you don't get to pretend that the recent seeming correlation with CO2 and temperature is causal. BECAUSE IT HASN'T BEEN BEFORE. That is the real leap, in terms of an objective perspective, CO2 hasn't worked the same in the past that people want to pretend it does today. No one debates whether or not it is a greenhouse gas, no one debates its physical properties, the debate is over whether or not it is causal now, when in the past it was not.

[/quote]

Then we are all in agrement. The climate is of course changing, it has before, it will again, and it is now. Short sighted and historically ignorant humans aside, we are now able to watch with much higher levels of resolution how the wonderful natural processes of our world sculpted it into the wonder that it is today. maybe more students will take geologic classes and learn a more macro level perspective, and others won't have quite the hubris that human have had in the past, we are here to rule, we are the best, humans rocks, how dare the planet not give us exactly the same weather and climate that we have enjoyed in our lifetimes! The audacity!

Not. And you can't prove humans are anything without understanding the system, and obviously those predicting temperature can't even get THAT right, how can they have any credibility if they decide to ignore the past changes in climate as well? Credibility just goes bye bye.

 

What an ironic statement given the number of times alarmists use whats happening on Greenland to do just that !

Correct, but the minute quantities involved here are dwarfed by other components like the sun water vapour ionisation of the upper atmosphere and many many other things we are as yet only vaguely cognisant of

There has been an increase from around 280PPM to 400PPM. This equates to a rise of 0.012% of total atmospheric volume over that period. Not only has the impact of this minute increase never been quantified, its fingerprint has never even been discerned as yet against natural variation. Despite that there are those who insist we legislate away our economic future nonetheless. A good example of this is the IPCC diktat claiming we need to reduce CO 2 emissions by 80% by 2050. Where did they get this figure because I'll be darned if I can find it in any published Peer reviewed literature to date ? My lunatic government has signed up for this madness too !

They have NO IDEA what the correct climate sensitivity value for CO 2 is. All we can be sure of is that everyone has guessed too high when one compares modelled projections vs direct observations of late

All of which have been doubtless been happening since long before anyone bothered to record them

Of course there is doubt otherwise the climate models would be getting it right

Yes indeed . We have evidence the climate varies. Big deal

No thats an assumption based entirely on shonky climate modelling. Theres nothing marking the current warming phase as anything but a natural one like many before it. The LIA was one of the coldest phases of the last 10,000 years there is nothing whatsoever to suggest this is not mother Earth simply recovering from this one like she has done many times before in this post glaciation period

Of course its relevant as are the more recent warming spikes too. Like I said before anything can be made unprecedented by the simple expedient of ignoring the precedents. Thats where the politics takes over from the science

 

And the evidence points to the former number as being accurate, as past large excursions in atmospheric CO2 concentration were not accomanied by large temperature excursions much exceeding the 1C sensitivity level.

No, they do not. They indicate that we may be entering what used to be called a climate OPTIMUM.

There has never been any real doubt of that.

That is nothing but a wild leap to a conclusion unjustified by empirical evidence.

Clearly false.

True.

False.

That claim is scientifically ABSURD.