Csteele persists with Hansen 1988, I presume he is referring to Hansen’s published testimony before the Senate committee; that infamous incident where Hansen turned up the heaters, closed the window and then intoned about rising temperatures. What a guy!

The 2 relevant Hansen papers are 1981:

http://thedgw.org/definitionsOut/..%5Cdocs%5CHansen_climate_impact_of_increasing_co2.pdf

And 1984:

http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/abs/ha07600n.html

In those papers Hansen gets a non-feedback climate sensitivity for 2XCO2 of 1.2-1.3C.

Foster and Rahmstorf [F&R] isolate a non-feedback climate sensitivity of between 1.4-1.8C.

This is, I suppose, why csteele argues that F&R ratify his mentor Hansen.

But F&R have shown there has been no alteration in the rate of global warming. And up to date that rate of global warming has been much less than what AGW [and Hansen in 1988] predicted. The solution for AGW is to differentiate between transient climate sensitivity [tcr] and equilibrium climate sensitivity [teq]. The difference between these 2 concepts is described here:

http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/tar/wg1/345.htm

The difference between tcr and teq is that tcr will occur in about 70 years and teq about 200 years; both tcr and teq are estimates of how long the heating from AGW takes to manifest in the global climate system. They are both a product of Trenberth’s missing heat, which is presumed to be in the ocean. BUT, if heat is not being stored in the ocean then that AGW rate will not rise in the future so both tcr and teq are contradicted.

Most of the recent studies are not showing any heat being stored in the oceans. Secondly, if the AGW temperature response is constant when CO2 is increasing, if AGW is real [ie something else is not causing the temperature increase] then feedbacks must working against the increased AGW effect in a negative fashion. So, this means that the negative feedbacks prevent any heat being produced so as to be capable of being stored in the ocean; which explains why heat is not being stored in the ocean.

F&R have proved there is no stored heat and whatever warming we have had has occurred. This is fundamentally different from Hansen.

Csteele is wrong.

@ Bonmot,

11 lines.

10 of which are personal attacks on other posters.

Only 1 of which (if we are generous) might be construed as a comment on AGW

Unsurprising? Absolutely!

Dear cohenite,

A welcome change in tone and I hope to respond in kind.

I'm a little pressed for time until this evening but I was indeed referring to Hansen's 1981 paper which for some reason I flagged erroneously as 1988 and as you say Foster and Rahmstorf did peg a higher climate sensitivity of a doubling of CO2 than Hansen.

I'm just a little confused to what you are arguing. If you don't believe in AGW nor it seems in the greenhouse effect then why are we splitting hairs on the very processes and studies that support them? Shouldn't you just be completely rejecting them outright or am I missing something?

Something has definitely improved there in the way you are responding, cohenite. Well…towards me at least, for which I thank you.

So I’ll retract my total dismissal of you as expressed on another thread recently and re-engage with you.

In your first post you put up this link:

http://joannenova.com.au/2012/05/models-get-the-core-assumptions-wrong-the-hot-spot-is-missing/

I agree that the computer models are only as good as the assumptions and data plugged into them, and that they are potentially way off the mark. But any flaws shown to exist in the models, or even a credible complete debunking of them, don’t prove that AGW is not real!

<< As for Flannery; he is hopeless… >>

Well, he has certainly gone downhill in my admiration of him, since the days of the Future Eaters. It would seem that his message is a little overdone and is certainly not a holistic outlook.

This really is a crying shame, because he has been one of the foremost commentators on sustainability.

I wish that the Climate Commission would morph into the Sustainability Commission. If it did, I would think that he would still be one of the best people in the country to lead it.

I’d like to think that his current diatribe is a result of restrictions placed upon him by his political masters, who know that he is inclined to be outspoken on a much broader front than just climate change. So if he was freed up, I think we’d all be a whole lot better off.

"If you don't believe in AGW nor it seems in the greenhouse effect then why are we splitting hairs on the very processes and studies that support them?"

CO2 is a heat trapping gas; it is constrained by Hotell's principle and Beer's law; at the current levels of CO2 concentration increases in CO2 have a logarithmic declining effect on temperature; this has been known for a long time; Schneider's 1971 paper describes the effect:

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/173/3992/138.abstract

Grapahically the effect is thus:

http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/co2_modtrans_img1.png

This can be confirmed by the use of the Modtran calculator:

http://geoflop.uchicago.edu/forecast/docs/Projects/modtran.html

What this means is that the heating capacity of CO2 is effectively exhausted, with further increases having almost immeasurable influence.

To overcome this AGW theory relies on heat being stored in the ocean and being released in the future and positive feedback from, primarily water. Neither is happening; the heat is not being stored in the oceans and water feedback, through clouds is negative.

AGW is a failed theory but that doesn't mean that CO2 is not a 'warming' gas. That is not "splitting hairs".

"Neither is happening; the heat is not being stored in the oceans and water feedback, through clouds is negative."

Nope:

http://www.climatewatch.noaa.gov/article/2012/state-of-the-climate-2011-ocean-heat

Clouds reflect sunlight back out to space, and inhibit infrared radiation from escaping to space. Clouds can have a positive, or sometimes a slightly negative, feedback.

The slight negative feedback from clouds does not cancel out the overwhelming positive feedback from water vapour.