Well said, John J. Thanks.

On climate models, Journal of Climate, volume 23, page 2740:

"The degree of confidence we place on model results essentially depends on whether we can quantify the uncertainty of the prediction, and demonstrate that the results do not depend strongly on modeling assumptions. Since there is no direct verification of future changes' forecasts, model performance and uncertainties need to be assessed indirectly through process understanding and model evaluation on PAST and PRESENT climate."

Alice (in Warmerland)

A very nice sermon ... for the converted. And no, I’m not a denialist -- I just mislike argumentum ad verecundiam. Glickson does a nice summary of some very good science. Pity he’s not above doing equally nice summaries of some alarmist, extreme, or outright dodgy positions. There’s no downside to reducing CO2 emissions, but there’s a very big downside to representing as certain what is clearly in dispute.

For instance, there is zero credible science to support the assertion that extreme weather events are a consequence of high atmospheric CO2 levels. That’s alarmist propaganda, and it demeans science to claim otherwise. The concept of a ‘tipping point’ is also pure speculation; the hypothesis is inconsistent what we claim to know about climate in earlier epochs, and no evidence suggests its relevance to earth’s climate. The claim that Antarctic ice thickness is decreasing by 30 ft a year is simply false. Estimates of Antarctic temperature in particular are highly controversial (there’s a strong tendency for the highest observed temperatures to be recorded near manned base stations); the number of weather stations is tiny, and standard deviations are huge. Assertions that 2010 set some sort of record for high temperatures lacks statistical significance, and climate scientists are apparently unwilling to acknowledge recent adjustments to the urban heat island effect on reported temperature averages.

And so on. What really convinces me that Glickson isn’t fair dinkum, though, is his list of technologies which he asserts we should adopt to reduce CO2 emission. Of his suggestions, only geothermal is a credible candidate for generation of base-load power. Carbon sequestration and nuclear are not mentioned. The former may or may not be a credible alternative — we have yet to do the requisite research & testing. The latter, however, is Europe’s technology of choice, and probably the only technology sufficiently developed to replace coal, gas and oil for humankind in the near term.

Climate Science isn’t settled because climate scientists have caught in flagrante delicto in recent years. We need less cheerleading and ideology, more impartial (and yes, sceptical) science to reach a decision.

Greenland's ice sheet holds enough ice to raise global sea levels by 7 metres. Ice melting at the surface and breaking off at the margins of the ice sheet is already adding up to about 300 gigatonnes each year. That accounts for about 25 per cent of the annual, global rise in sea levels.

Last month's meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco highlighted the situation. Jason Box of Ohio State University in Columbus and colleagues listed Greenland's "biggest losers": the five glaciers and ice streams that lost the greatest area of ice in the past decade. The Petermann glacier topped the chart, with 500 square kilometres.

But not all ice is created equal. Glaciers in the north like Petermann and Humboldt lost a lot of thin, floating ice that does not impede the outward flow of ice behind. That means the glaciers did not immediately surge seaward. But thicker ice was exposed to the ocean. Thicker ice acts like a cork in a bottle: take it away and the glaciers accelerate. "If we continue to lose ice, we'll start losing important ice," says team member Ian Howat, also at Ohio State University. "If these glaciers were to accelerate and mobilise the large amount of ice up in northern Greenland, it has the potential for a huge change."

If (only) we continue to lose ice, yada yada

If (only) these glaciers were to yada yada

If wishes were horses, beggars would ride - the climate is not going as some climate scientists and alarmists want it to .. to rightly punish unbelievers.

donkeygod nails it .. well said

AoM: Curmudgeon et al interested in Skeptical Science? Obviously not.

Future temperature for a doubling of [CO2] is used as an ‘indicator’ by convention, there is much literature (and on-going research) on this. Indeed, it is a common distortion of “the science is settled” meme trotted out in the denialosphere that confuses many a layperson. As for feedbacks, much work is being done on that too, including that by Roy Spencer whom Jon J linked to at WUWT. But typically, his own WUWT followers misrepresent and distort even his comments. For example;

“... The most recent decade averaged somewhat warmer than the previous two decades, the anomaly values will be about 0.1 deg. C lower than they used to be. This does NOT affect the long-term trend of the data…it only reflects a change in the zero-level, which is somewhat arbitrary...

And;

... As far as the race for warmest year goes, 1998 (+0.424 deg. C) barely edged out 2010 (+0.411 deg. C), but the difference (0.01 deg. C) is nowhere near statistically significant. So feel free to use or misuse those statistics to your heart’s content...”

And they do.

If you look at Spencer’s graph of ‘running averages’, you could say global warming stopped in 1981, again in 1988, again in 1991, again in 1998, and again in 2010. However, if you conduct linear trend analysis over this period, you will see a statistically significant upward warming trend. Moreover, if you filter the 1998 El Nino outlier and the La Nina of 2010 the linear trend is clearly positive, and clearly significant.

I wouldn’t be too concerned with release of methane from deep ocean clathrates just yet. Although possible, it is very unlikely to happen any time soon. The melting permafrost is another story, it is happening now.

Donkeygod
There is very credible science about the radiative properties of GHG’s. If you put more energy into a system, the system tries to equilibrate – this is being seen and observed now.

Rather than focusing on “alarmist tipping points”, I suggest you look up “squealing” – also happening now. Your assertion that ‘climate scientists are unwilling to acknowledge recent adjustments to the urban heat island effect’ is stupid. The UHIE has been known about for decades and is accounted for. Oh, and there is more than one way to measure temperature than with thermometers at remote locations. Some have even tweaked to satellites.

I agree, nuclear power should be considered in the mix. Would like to hear the author's response. However, I expect this article is just one that has been on OLO's file for some time.

Rpg
There is much research being conducted in the hope of poking holes in the findings of climate scientists. Unfortunately, the science is becoming more robust.

Of course, people of your ilk typically want to withdraw funding from climate science. Go figure.