I happen to be one of those scientists who are predisposed to accepting the historically respectable proposition that increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is likely to influence the heat balance of the planet and hence its climate. That doesn't mean I think disaster lies ahead - but it might. In my contributions to the climate change 'debate' I usually make two claims: we don't know how bad climate change will be (as above), and we don't know what to do about it. Don tends to focus on the first aspect and consequently ventures, as here, into a field that to my mind is extremely complicated, needs a strong background in the specific science, and is littered with booby traps. Frankly I would not dare go there. The second aspect is actually more critical. According to the way they vote, over half the population of Australia seems convinced that the technical and economic problem of powering our economy with energy from the wind and sun has been solved, unequivocally. They vote accordingly and governments tend to respond accordingly. If they are right it simply doesn't matter if carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, if there is a hiatus in warming or not, and so on. If you like, we could all happily dis-include (great word!) those climate issues from our thinking. What I am saying is that the primary issue is not the detailed analysis and interpretation of climate data but the source and significance of our future energy supplies. That's where the debate should be. For the record, my own view is that renewable energy cannot possibly replace fossil fuels in powering our economy, or anyone else’s for that matter. I have recently been told that mine is a defeatist attitude. So be it.

Does any of this temperature stuff, or projections of temperature change over this century matter? Why and how do we know?

Temperature change is neither good nor bad. Temperature change is not a measure of damage or of economic benefit or loss. We need to know what are the impacts of temperature change. And we need to know the impacts locally.

I've been progressively coming to the conclusion over the past 10 years or so of following the climate debate that CO2 emissions are more likely to be net beneficial than net damaging for the planet. Certainly, fossil fuels are massively net beneficial for humanity and for the environment: http://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/humanity-unbound-how-fossil-fuels-saved-humanity-nature-nature-humanity.

Therefore, until there is a cheaper alternative to provide the worlds energy, fossil fuels are essential and the world will not be reducing their use. So for those who are concerned about CO2 emissions and want to replace fossil fuels, they need to focus on making the alternatives cheaper as well as fit for purpose. You should forget about renewables because the reality is they can have little impact on replacing fossil fuels or reducing global CO2 emissions.

I need to make a correction. On my website I have already accepted that Karl et al are not using the temperature records of Argo buoys, but of the drifting weather buoys, of which there are more than 1000. I jumped too quickly into an assumption. The error does not in any way invalidate the argument, apart from making me look silly!

Overlooked is the fact that the solar furnace has been in a waning phase since the mid-seventies. (NASA)

If it was just down to the solar furnace, we would see more summer ice, no melting permafrost, and weather events less not more severe!?

That said, it is always true that in the seeds of adversity, there's always an advantage.

And for us that is the fact we could power our industries for thousands of years with our (Cheaper than coal) thorium?

If reserved exclusively for them?

And coupled to micro grids, able to power our own (car, truck, ship, sub) industries for half the current power price!

Moreover, given direct reduction, the lowest costing lowest carbon emitting steel; and given aluminium is congealed electricity, the cheapest to make, aluminium.

Ditto all light metals smelting.

Copious NG would enable a smarter country, to rejig it's transport options to CNG, wherever much cheaper electricity couldn't be used? And the latter includes trains, trams and trolley buses!

CSG needs to be reconsidered, given new desal makes as much as 97% of the saline water potable and for quarter of the previous lowest possible cost.

Meaning, a whole host of new irrigation options becomes newly cost effective!

And wouldn't some of our drought ravaged farmers love some of that and the certainty it would provide?

And why wouldn't a smart country decide to convert it's biological waste into the world's cheapest domestic energy option, and follow that with broad scale oil rich algae production?

And with the oil removed, use the remaining biomass as the basis for an ethanol industry that needs no foodstuff, nor arable land for its production.

And all of it available to a country able to actually use the brains it was born with; as opposed to just denying this or that isn't happening?

And if it is or isn't?

How does that prevent us from choosing smarter less costly options, and just because they're far less costly, than how much they might reduce our (highest per capita) carbon output?
Rhrosty.

The so called hiatus finished in 2011, If you take 1997 or 98 date as the start date and use any of the 3 most widely accepted data sets, global warming has clearly resumed with 2014 being the hottest year on record since temperature data has been collected. Note for those who would quote the last IPCC report it was published in 2013 and the cut off for data was earlier.

There is however no need to rely on temperature data according to http://nsidc.org/

“Between 1979 and 1996 Arctic sea ice declined at around 36,000 sq km a year, on average. Since 1997, the rate of loss has accelerated to dramatically to 130,000 sq km per year.”

It just does not make sense that global warming stopped after 1997 but yet the Arctic ice started to melt 3.6 times quicker.

There is a similar problem with sea level rise where the trend has also been on the rise over the last 18 years with an increase from about 2mm per year to over 3mm over the period. Roughly half of the measured sea level rise is accounted for by ice melt the other half by thermal expansion. The sea level is simply not going to rise faster during a period when the globe is not warming.

Don unfortunately takes a political view of the climate science assuming it is some sort of left wing plot against the only true right science. Sorry but science could not care less what your politics are, and nature even less.

Note the eminent scientist, Tombee. Good one, mate. I always knew you were a scientist. Bet you didn't know that I'm Lord Spencer.

The twisting and turning the climate alarmists do. As soon as most people catch up to climate fraud, they 'discover' something new. They are like little kids caught out lying. They can't give in, so come up with an even bigger porky.

Coal got another belting on 4 Corners last night, so it looks as if we are are in for yet another round of scaremongering leading up to the scaremongersfest in Paris.