The pause, and sea levels.

[anticrank]

Hi All,

Much has been made of the so-called global warming pause. Recent studies (for example http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories201 ... years.html) suggest that there has been no pause in global warming.

Likewise, global mean sea level has continued to rise throughout the period of the so-called pause:

http://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/sea-level/

Sea level rise is caused primarily by two factors related to global warming: the added water from melting land ice and the expansion of sea water as it warms.

Global mean temperature must be computed from a discrete sample of measurement points. The distribution of heat within the climate-ocean system can 'hide' accumulated heat from these sampling points (by burying it deep in the oceans, for a while). What the system can't do is prevent that heat from affecting the oceans. Most of the additional heat from radiative forcing goes into the oceans. Even if it escapes our thermometers, it warms and expands the oceans, and sea levels continue to rise in spite of the apparent pause.

It seems now that our measurements of global mean temperature are 'catching up' with what the oceans have been telling us all along. The planet has been getting warmer, even as the thermometers appeared to say otherwise: no pause.

anticrank

[Sorcery]

Sea level rise is caused primarily by two factors related to global warming: the added water from melting land ice and the expansion of sea water as it warms.

It is also complicated by isostatic rebound from the ice ages and by groundwater extraction in places like Florida, and island communities.
The coastal tide guage data dating back to 1870 in http://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/sea-level/ shows no change in rate of increase. The increase in CO2 is said to have really taken off after 1945 so how can we connect the rate of sea level rise to CO2?

[TopOnePercent]

Sea level rise is caused primarily by two factors related to global warming: the added water from melting land ice and the expansion of sea water as it warms.

It is also complicated by isostatic rebound from the ice ages and by groundwater extraction in places like Florida, and island communities.
The coastal tide guage data dating back to 1870 in http://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/sea-level/ shows no change in rate of increase. The increase in CO2 is said to have really taken off after 1945 so how can we connect the rate of sea level rise to CO2?

There is no connection. The Romans were able to grow passable wine in Britain, afterwards people would ice skate on the Thames. The global temperature has always warmed up and cooled down throughout human history, and it will continue to do so. The sea level has variously been higher or lower than it is today, and it will be such again tomorrow.

[XFool]

There is no connection. The Romans were able to grow passable wine in Britain, afterwards people would ice skate on the Thames. The global temperature has always warmed up and cooled down throughout human history, and it will continue to do so. The sea level has variously been higher or lower than it is today, and it will be such again tomorrow.

Except that the Medieval Warm Period wasn't a time of Global Warming:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medieval_Warm_Period

According to Wikipedia there is still not a consensus(!) on the cause of The Little Ice Age. But note the variety of internal and external 'forcing' agents that have been proposed as a mechanism:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Ice_Age

The thing that always strikes me about climate science is that it is clearly a very complex subject, with many large scale and complicated mechanisms involving a wide range of physical science and statistical methods. My conclusion is that simple minded, amateur 'explanations' on arbitrary bulletin boards - of which there are myriads - are almost always going to be simplistic, misleading and wrong.

[quelquod]

TopOnePercent wrote:
The Romans were able to grow passable wine in Britain.....

XFool wrote:
Except that the Medieval Warm Period wasn't a time of Global Warming:
.........
My conclusion is that simple minded, amateur 'explanations' on arbitrary bulletin boards - of which there are myriads - are almost always going to be simplistic, misleading and wrong.

However, the posters on these random boards, who aren't all as ignorant of 'science' (to generalise the area) as you'd have us believe, don't generally have an axe to grind aside from having no reputation to lose. Scientists have been known to err before, even en masse.
And BTW the Romans weren't here much in Medieval Times, they had their own warm period (scientifically accepted I believe ).
Good old Wikipedia.

[Alaric]

Except that the Medieval Warm Period wasn't a time of Global Warming:

Unless the evidence from recorded history is disputed, it was a warmer climate in the Northern Hemisphere, Vikings in Greenland etc. If the globe as a whole wasn't warmer, the Southern Hemisphere would have to have been colder to balance the averages. The Wiki article, based on Peru, seems to be suggesting the opposite.

[TopOnePercent]

The thing that always strikes me about climate science is that it is clearly a very complex subject, with many large scale and complicated mechanisms involving a wide range of physical science and statistical methods. My conclusion is that simple minded, amateur 'explanations' on arbitrary bulletin boards - of which there are myriads - are almost always going to be simplistic, misleading and wrong.

Stop offering them then! Your blind faith in your religion is fascinating, if irritating, all the more so because you don't recognise it for what it is.

[Injunear]

Most of the additional heat from radiative forcing goes into the oceans.

What do you think you mean by this statement?

What do think heat is?

What do you think radiative forcing is?

What do you think additional heat is?

[anticrank]

Most of the additional heat from radiative forcing goes into the oceans.

What do you think you mean by this statement?

What do think heat is?

What do you think radiative forcing is?

What do you think additional heat is?

I know exactly what is meant by those terms. Do you have a point to make?

anticrank

[XFool]

The thing that always strikes me about climate science is that it is clearly a very complex subject, with many large scale and complicated mechanisms involving a wide range of physical science and statistical methods. My conclusion is that simple minded, amateur 'explanations' on arbitrary bulletin boards - of which there are myriads - are almost always going to be simplistic, misleading and wrong.

Stop offering them then!

I'M NOT!

Err... you haven't noticed this? What conclusion do you think I should reasonably draw from that? What would be a "logical" conclusion to draw?

[Sorcery]

The thing that always strikes me about climate science is that it is clearly a very complex subject, with many large scale and complicated mechanisms involving a wide range of physical science and statistical methods.

I would agree with that. Climate science relies on most of the scientific disciplines going. Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Statistics, Computer Science, Paleontology + some of it's own + all the subdivisions. Then the policy response has to deal with the vested interests, the uncertainty involved, the survival likelihood, the maybe a bit of warming is good, idea, That's what makes it fascinating.

]My conclusion is that simple minded, amateur 'explanations' on arbitrary bulletin boards - of which there are myriads - are almost always going to be simplistic, misleading and wrong.

There I am not so sure. I have learned a lot from my frequently plugged site. The commentators argue like cats & dogs and impute the worst possible motives. A reader can actually pick up on the weaknesses of argument on one side of many issues by listening to the arguments. That's possible here.too I would guess. Any level of discussion has got to be better than the old TMF Climate change echo chamber.

Good luck with it

[TopOnePercent]

The thing that always strikes me about climate science is that it is clearly a very complex subject, with many large scale and complicated mechanisms involving a wide range of physical science and statistical methods. My conclusion is that simple minded, amateur 'explanations' on arbitrary bulletin boards - of which there are myriads - are almost always going to be simplistic, misleading and wrong.

Stop offering them then!

I'M NOT!

Err... you haven't noticed this? What conclusion do you think I should reasonably draw from that? What would be a "logical" conclusion to draw?

That your response to any post that disagrees with your faith is hostile, petulant, and often irrelevant?

ETA: You might like to take a moment to reflect on why you believe in AGW, for which less evidence exists than for that of ${deity}.

[hiriskpaul]

The coastal tide guage data dating back to 1870 in http://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/sea-level/ shows no change in rate of increase.

Actually it does.

ftp://soest.hawaii.edu/coastal/Coastal% ... ration.pdf

[XFool]

Stop offering them then!

I'M NOT!

Err... you haven't noticed this? What conclusion do you think I should reasonably draw from that? What would be a "logical" conclusion to draw?

That your response to any post that disagrees with your faith is hostile, petulant, and often irrelevant?

I see. So that is your 'interpretation' of my very factual reply to your factual error: "I'M NOT!"?

Oh well! That's the way the logic crumbles, I guess.

[TopOnePercent]

I'M NOT!

Err... you haven't noticed this? What conclusion do you think I should reasonably draw from that? What would be a "logical" conclusion to draw?

That your response to any post that disagrees with your faith is hostile, petulant, and often irrelevant?

I see. So that is your 'interpretation' of my very factual reply to your factual error: "I'M NOT!"?

Oh well! That's the way the logic crumbles, I guess.

You're simply not making any sense at this point. Have you spent a little much time in the pub this evening perhaps?

[XFool]

I would agree with that. Climate science relies on most of the scientific disciplines going. Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Statistics, Computer Science, Paleontology + some of it's own + all the subdivisions. Then the policy response has to deal with the vested interests, the uncertainty involved, the survival likelihood, the maybe a bit of warming is good, idea, That's what makes it fascinating.

That's what makes it too complicated and messy for me! Doesn't mean I don't accept it or think it isn't important. Just that I prefer simpler things.

My conclusion is that simple minded, amateur 'explanations' on arbitrary bulletin boards - of which there are myriads - are almost always going to be simplistic, misleading and wrong.

Any level of discussion has got to be better than the old TMF Climate change echo chamber.

I avoided that, apart from one brief intervention. These so called 'debates' on climate change are pointless. They are, in my experience, always the same kind of thing. And science is rarely that 'thing'.

It is the same when some bible basher starts asking for "information" on a science thread (or whatever) about "evolution". You know the last thing they are after is "information"!

[XFool]

LMF seems to have a limitation on the number of nested quotes. So...

-------
XFool wrote:
The thing that always strikes me about climate science is that it is clearly a very complex subject, with many large scale and complicated mechanisms involving a wide range of physical science and statistical methods. My conclusion is that simple minded, amateur 'explanations' on arbitrary bulletin boards - of which there are myriads - are almost always going to be simplistic, misleading and wrong.

TopOnePercent wrote:
Stop offering them then!

XFool wrote:
I'M NOT!

Err... you haven't noticed this? What conclusion do you think I should reasonably draw from that? What would be a "logical" conclusion to draw?

TopOnePercent wrote:
That your response to any post that disagrees with your faith is hostile, petulant, and often irrelevant?

XFool (re)wrote:
I see. So that is your 'interpretation' of my very factual reply to your factual error?: "I'M NOT!"

Oh well! That's the way the logic crumbles, I guess.
-------

I hope that aids your understanding, TOP.

[XFool]

We're exiting a ice age and have had a remarkably stable/predictable climate for ages. The normal is much more turbulent and variable with wild swings between extremes. What with the moon slowly drifting away (that helps keep the earths orbit stable) and melted ice effects, sooner or later we'll see a return to the longer term 'normal'. Unlikely that we'll have the technology/resources to keep the earth in a 'abnormal' state.

Yes, but here you are talking about lengths of time comparable to or even much greater than the human species has been around. AGW is indeed a long term concern but it isn't about time on that scale. In geological terms it's about now. It's about our modern world with a spam of about two or three centuries AFAIK.

[Injunear]

Most of the additional heat from radiative forcing goes into the oceans.


What do you think you mean by this statement?

What do think heat is?

What do you think radiative forcing is?

What do you think additional heat is?



I know exactly what is meant by those terms. Do you have a point to make?

Well as you made a point that I assume made sense to you, I assumed also that you would be able to say why. Perhaps not.

Your statement does not make much sense to me because, for example, heat does not go anywhere. But perhaps your understanding of heat is different from mine, which is why I asked the question. I might have asserted that you are wrong but I would like to know why you think what you do. Perhaps I am wrong.

I am not sure if I would understand at all what you mean by radiative forcing, which is why I asked the question.

I am not sure at all that I understand what you mean by "additional heat", which is why I asked the question.

it is up to you whether you want to communicate something useful or simply broadcast your assertions, but surely the point of a debate is to have an exchange of views, not simply a statement of "I know what I mean". I know what I mean too but I don't assume I am omniscient.

[redsturgeon]

Moderator Message:
Redsturgeon: some of the responses here have become a little personal. But since none of the current protagonists seems to mind the robust level of debate then I will let the thread run. Please be aware that it will be locked if things spiral down.