freeman

I think if we are to take that mathematician's results seriously he should take a look at the models for sea- level rise in peer-reviewed articles and be able to point out what is wrong with them. If he can't address the question in a scientific way--by pointing out where scientists have got it wrong rather than trying to prove that observed ice melt would not be enough at a constant rate for a 3 feet rise--why should we pay attention? Are we going to deal with this issue in a scientific manner or are we going to trust that these mathematical calculations have validity when we don't know what data it might be missing or false assumptions it might be making?

Hinderachers article was not published in a scientific journal, and was not peer reviewed before publishing. It was published in a Koch sponsored web site and republished in the conservative echo chamber of blogs and web sites. It was never intended to actually challenge scientific opinion, it was designed and intended to support the "belief systems" of those on the right who never look at scientific material.
A few years back scientists like Michael Mann were making an effort to rebut stuff like Hinderachers when it showed up in the media.They don't seem to bother anymore, and I suspect they've learned that the audience for this nonsense isn't persuaded by science.
The Johnson "analysis" was published in 2005 and long ago debunked. (Only land ice matters). But, the nature of the Internet is that it appears out there as if it were relevant today.
We should accept the scientific communities general views on climate change, and stop feeling we have to convince those who think science is about "belief". The two things stand in direct contradiction.
It is impossible to support the notion that it is possible for someone who is generally interested in climate change, hasn't had the chance to be exposed to a comprehensive scientific explanation, that provides an understanding. Even in the US where the media has failed to offer the public a true reflection of the scientific consensus it is possible to reach out and learn. The portion of the public that isn't convinced has decided that if they don't believe it, it won't come true.

danivon

Firstly I have not disputed the "math". I have disputed the assumptions that it is based on

If the basic assumptions are wrong, the math cannot be correct... I took a short cut.
You are the most anal person...
On the other hand, I am impressed at the patience and persistence and obvious skill in working out the numbers yourself. But you should know by now that Fate isn't interested in information that makes him challenge his belief system.

The range of predictions by the IPCC has proven to be too conservative according to Jeremy Rifkin.
That includes temperature rise, the speed of the oceans rise, the change in salinity and most important the change in the water content in the atmosphere. If I remember correctly every 1 degree change in the temperature of the atmosphere increases the average moisture content 15%. meaning the dry parts of the Earth will get drier, and the wet wetter, and severe rainfall events will increase in intensity. All of that is happening now. (see floods in Europe and Asia of late).
The arguement from those who want to believe is that "there have always been floods and always been weather". And that'f true. But the evidence is that there is more and the events are more severe..

rickyp wrote:

Firstly I have not disputed the "math". I have disputed the assumptions that it is based on

If the basic assumptions are wrong, the math cannot be correct... I took a short cut.
You are the most anal person...

I am a mathematician. That does bring with it (or perhaps attract) a certain level of focus on the details. And when we are talking about maths, well, please indulge a little perfectionism. If I am going to challenge a sceptic's position, I want to ensure I am not myself undermining my own argument with lax logic. It opens the door.

The maths can be correct, or incorrect, regardless of the starting assumptions. False assumptions will, however, tend to render any outcome using even the most rigorous mathematical process suspect. But not necessarily, and whether it does (and how much) depends completely on the assumptions rather than the math.

His numbers were pretty close, and not enough to make a difference, and it would be dishonest of me to claim otherwise.

On the other hand, I am impressed at the patience and persistence and obvious skill in working out the numbers yourself. But you should know by now that Fate isn't interested in information that makes him challenge his belief system.

And yet that is the charge he levels against me without any evidence to back it up. Who says Americans can't do irony?

The range of predictions by the IPCC has proven to be too conservative according to Jeremy Rifkin.
That includes temperature rise, the speed of the oceans rise, the change in salinity and most important the change in the water content in the atmosphere. If I remember correctly every 1 degree change in the temperature of the atmosphere increases the average moisture content 15%. meaning the dry parts of the Earth will get drier, and the wet wetter, and severe rainfall events will increase in intensity. All of that is happening now. (see floods in Europe and Asia of late).
The arguement from those who want to believe is that "there have always been floods and always been weather". And that'f true. But the evidence is that there is more and the events are more severe..

In some cases it has been too conservative. But what happens often is that people (those who accept climate change and want to promote action, and those who oppose it and want to make it look ridiculous, and the media who are not necessarily scientifically literate and prone to sensationalism) take the 'worst case' predictions, and in most situations they have exceeded the real change. So it looks worse.

But that is not the fault of the science, it is the fault of the interpretation, and it's a bear trap that the sceptics love to set, and that some... 'enthusiastic' activists for the environment can't seem to help themselves from setting and falling into.

When we look at the actual science, and the attempts to predict using models, then they have so far performed quite well, given the constraints of reality. Unfortunately, whenever I try to focus on the science on here, people try to look at the politics, the media, the activists....

This study of Greenland's glacier in 2012 indicates that Greenland would contribute a 4 inch rise in sea level by 2100. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/ ... eared.html
This article about Greenland indicates that by 2012 it was contributing 20-25 percent of sea level rise
This article discusses the max estimate of three feet rise by the IPCC in 2013. The article mentions that the 2007 estimate of a max sea level rise did not include Greenland or Antartica.http://e360.yale.edu/feature/rising_wat ... rise/2702/

This set of projections has different sea levels based on including different things. It gives an indication of how much is due to ocean warming, ice sheet loss, etc.
http://cpo.noaa.gov/Home/AllNews/TabId/ ... sment.aspx
IPCC report 2007. http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_dat ... ml#table-4
Here's some math for Dan: http://www.nature.com/srep/2013/131212/ ... 03461.html
This is an older IPCC article but it has a good discussion of the issues.http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/far/wg_I ... ter_09.pdf
Another interesting article on sea level. It quotes a leading scientist Dr Hansen from NASA as presenting a scenario where the rate of ice sheet melting doubles every decade
http://www.wunderground.com/climate/Sea ... e.asp?MR=1

This study found in 2007 that 60 percent of contribution to sea level rise from ice melt came from glaciers and ice caps rather than the ice sheets in antartica and Greenland.
http://m.sciencemag.org/content/317/584 ... ritype=cgi
Anyway, I think Dan arguments/hypotheses that thermal warming and increases in ice melt rates over time explain the critique of that mathematician.

This article is not scientific and so doesn't add anything in the way of evidence to either side of this discussion. But I think it puts things in an interesting perspective. Plus, it's relatively short and well-written.

From the NYTimes back in early May:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/03/opini ... .html?_r=0

2014 was the warmest year so far. Warmer than 2010 and 2005, which themselves were warmer than 1998.

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/

So, umm, "pause"?

danivon wrote:2014 was the warmest year so far. Warmer than 2010 and 2005, which themselves were warmer than 1998.

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/

So, umm, "pause"?

interestingly the temperature increase was .02c with a margin of error of .1c. So the temperature is only 20% of the margin of error. I believe in the science fields that is called statistically insignificant.

Oh and the NASA scientist that released the report, Gavin Schmidt, said the likelihood of 2014 being the warmest year since 1880 (the first year of recorded global temperatures) is only 38%.

So, umm "pause" is correct.

http://thefederalist.com/2015/01/19/glo ... on-record/

Well, lets see if other bodies come up with different results. The UK Met Office uses a different dataset.

And using decadal averages or trends, the margin of error falls. Also, it is right that one particular year does not itself mean a lot. But when you look at the "cooler" years in the last 16, there is still an upward trend over time.

t's true that Willis and nearly every other climate scientist dismiss the idea that global warming has paused. Yet the fact remains that average surface temperatures worldwide have not increased since around the turn of the century.
To the casual observer, the lack of warming at the Earth's surface, contrasted to climate scientists' insistence that the planet is still warming, might seem like a conundrum.
As scientists like Willis explain, though, most of the extra heat trapped by greenhouse gases does not warm the Earth's surface anyway.
Why do rising sea levels ignore the pause?
"Over 90 percent of the heat that we trap ... is warming the oceans," Willis said.
So as a measure of global warming, surface temperatures are not a good yardstick, because the atmosphere can only hold a small percentage of the heat that is trapped, he said.
Rather, the oceans should be the primary barometer of global climate change.

And they are certainly changing. Sea levels are going up "like gangbusters," Willis said.
The recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change physical science draft report, released in late September, said it is a near certainty that rates of sea-level rise -- pushed up largely because warmer water expands -- have accelerated over the last two centuries.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/artic ... ng-paused/

If you want a close up idea of what warming is doing to the oceans, watch The Polar Sea.
http://tvo.org/video/205338/polar-sea-preview

Its a fastenating story of various boats attempting the passage of the North West Passage this past summer. Including families in sailing yachts, and yahoos on sea doos. It follows one Swede in particular.
But what it also shows is how fast warming is happening in the northern ocean.

Oh and the NASA scientist that released the report, Gavin Schmidt, said the likelihood of 2014 being the warmest year since 1880 (the first year of recorded global temperatures) is only 38%.

The NOAA give it as a 48% chance but still that may seem low. But because it is slightly higher than 2010 and 2005, this makes sense.

So, umm "pause" is correct.

Except that the "pause" is supposed to be from 1998. And we really measure over longer periods to get an idea of the trends than one year, or comparing just two single years with each other.

For example, I looked at the NOAA data you can find here: http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/cag/time-serie ... /1880-2014 and took the average for each ten year period from 1985-94 up to 2005-2014.

The Average anomaly for 2005-14 is higher than the rest, at 0.6

Go back to 1995-2004, the previous ten years, and it is 0.515

And 1985-94 it is 0.285

So yes, the rate of increase has slowed down, it's not conclusively a 'pause'. A low sunspot period is also a factor. The activity during the peak period of the current cycle (2009-c.2020) is less intense than the previous cycles (1986-1997 and 1997-2009). Higher sunspot activity would lead to higher global temperatures, all else being equal.

Arctic sea ice is smallest size on record this winter

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/03/ ... 8A20150319

bbauska

Most of the Southern Ocean’s frozen cover grows and retreats every year, leading to little perennial sea ice in Antarctica.

The Antarctic situation was covered in the first article...
However, its important to note the difference in the ice measurements mentioned in the articles.
Its perennial sea ice which is most important. First as an indication of seasonal warming. Second because sea ice reflects solar radiation. When sea ice disappears for a period of time that solar radiation reaches the ocean surface and is mostly absorbed.
Antarctica sees its sea ice disappear every year. Arctic ice has only ever lost a portion of its ice.... Its that portion that is bigger every year. The retreat also takes place a little earlier each year, and refreezing comes a little later each year...
The news from Antarctica doesn't offset the news from the Arctic.

bbauska wrote:http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/arctic-antarctic-ice.html

Why are you citing an article from three years ago?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/ener ... outh-pole/

The issue with Antarctica is not the sea ice, it's the land-borne ice. Because if sea ice melts it won't affect sea levels, but land ice melting (or just 'moving' on to the sea) adds water to the sea.

Also, the article above shows that the increased sea ice around Antarctica is not enough to offset the Arctic sea ice loss.

Just stating that both ice caps are fluctuating and have been for all times. Can we agree that they do fluctuate?

bbauska

Can we agree that they do fluctuate

No.
A least not over a this period of time.
The U.N. panel of climate scientists links the long-term shrinkage of the ice (in the Arctic) , by 3.8 percent a decade since 1979,
If you want to talk about millenial periods...sure. But over those periods of time the oceans also rose and fell hundreds of feet.

If you think non-perennial ice coverage in the Antarctic means something significant, then find some science which confirms your opinion. Even the article you quote, doesn't make claims that the Antarctic seasonal coverage has any meaning in terms of our warming globe.