Climatologist Roy Spencer Rains on Global Warming Model Predictions
Ronald Bailey | February 27, 2007, 7:41am
University of Alabama Huntsville climatologist Roy Spencer weighs in as a global warming "moderate" in the New York Post:
Computerized models of our climate have had a habit of "drifting" too warm or too cold. This because they still don't contain all of the temperature-stabilizing processes that exist in nature. In fact, for the amount of solar energy available to it, our climate seems to have a "preferred" average temperature, damping out swings beyond 1 degree or so.
I believe that, through various negative feedback mechanisms, the atmosphere "decides" how much of the available sunlight will be allowed in, how much greenhouse effect it will generate in response, and what the average temperature will be.
Finally, remember that phrase, "the Earth's greenhouse effect keeps the Earth habitably warm?" I'll bet you never heard the phrase that is, quantitatively, more accurate: "Weather processes keep the Earth habitably cool."
Were it not for weather, the natural greenhouse effect would cause the surface of the Earth to average 140 degrees. Wonder why we never hear that fact stated?
I believe that when the stabilizing effects of precipitation systems are better understood and included into the models, predictions of global warming will be scaled back.
Despite current inadequacies, climate models are still our best tools for forecasting global warming. Those tools just aren't sharp enough yet.
UAH climatologists Spencer and John Christy are the principal investigators who have been compiling data from NOAA satellites on global temperature trends since 1978. Their data indicates that global average temperatures are going up at about 0.14 degrees Celsius per decade which is at the lower end of the climate model projections.
See whole Spencer article here.
For my views on global warming look here and here.
SugarFree | February 27, 2007, 9:56am | #
What an exhausting conversation to keep having.
Global warming has become an article of faith to too many people to stop it with simple logic.
The Gorean Creed
We believe in Global Warming
the Sea-Raiser, the All-Powerful,
maker of tsunami and hurricane,
of all that is, seen and unseen.
We believe in one Cause, The Activities of Man,
the lowest of all creatures,
except the ones that are brown.
Gasses from Coal, not Recycling from Blight,
true Cause from true Gasoline,
made, not begotten,
of Driving when One Could Walk;
through Man all pollutions were made.
For us and for our salvation
Gore came down from heaven,
was incarnate of the Holy Nader
and the Virgin Chomsky
and became truly political.
For our sake he was un-elected
under Pontius Harris;
he suffered defeat and was retired.
On the third year he rose again
in accordance with the Documentatrians;
he ascended into Hollywood
and is seated at the right hand
of the Film Executives.
He will come again in glory
to judge the polluting and the recycling,
and his kingdom will have a biodegradable end.
We believe in Global Warming, the Destroyer,
and the taker of life,
who proceeds from the Car and the Industry,
who with the Suburbs and the Factory Farm
is worshiped and glorified,
by the prophets of GREED.
We believe in the scientists who agree with us
and our beliefs.
We accept the starvation of Billions,
for the forgiveness of environmental sins.
We look for the return to subsistence farming,
and the whole grain life of the world to come.
Amen.
SugarFree | February 27, 2007, 11:10am | #
joe,
I didn't say that they wanted that. I don't think most of the reverends want that, but once they've converted everyone, it's easy enough to pontificate about lifestyle choice. That's when the radicals will slide under the door.
I like to make the religion analogy because they have such a holier than thou attitude about it all.
"I drive a hybrid, I'm so much better then you gas guzzlers."
"You drive a hybrid? I'm all electric, you must be some sort of monster."
"You have a car? I ride my bike everywhere."
"You ride a bike made in a factory? I whittled mine out of wood."
"You cut down a tree to make a bike? I made mine out of driftwood."
"You don't walk everywhere?"
As for alternative energy sources, I think environmentalists like them for their inefficiencies. It will take decades for alternative energy sources to rival the energy density of carbon, decades the reverends can use to spread envrioluddism. If they were serious about alternative energy, pebble-bed reactors or solar energy satellites would be on the table (or at least discussed more).
Oh, and I don't get to work by riding a cigarette.
(Sorry, I know that was flip... at least I didn't scream GODWIN...)
thoreau | February 27, 2007, 4:06pm | #
Ron-
Yep, correcting data (well, more accurately, correcting the analysis of the raw data) is fine.
There's nothing wrong with being a hold-out who's reluctant to revisit the original analysis. Data should be re-analyzed if/when an error is spotted, not just because the result is anomalous. Doing the re-analysis and publishing it is a sign of honesty.
Still, when somebody was a hold-out in his field, then moves to the far end of the consensus, then turns out to be a crank in regard to another field, well, it's a questionable track record. In the end, of course, it's results and replication that matter. But when trying to work one's way through a controversy, when trying to make sense of things in the midst of that process, credibility
does matter. The reality is that even practicing scientists, in working their way through a problem, have to take some experts at their word, i.e. pick collaborators with skills that we lack and trust their work. Now, the continuance of that trust is conditional on their work checking out, but we begin the process by looking at credibility and qualifications. We don't just latch onto the first collaborator who says "Oh, I know something about this!"
I'm not saying you just latched onto him. I'm mostly addressing the question of whether we should even care about credibility (which runs the risk of being a self-reinforcing consensus) or instead just look at replication. Replication is indeed the ultimate test over the long time horizon, but in a period where results are up in the air (or at least up in the air within some range of values), credibility is a useful tool for navigating uncertainty. (Although trust must be tempered with skepticism.)
