My reasoning? Already given.

If: your thoughts are that,

And: ‘tout ça est une blague’,

Then: ‘cela n’est pas plus fin, que ça’.

So: Where will you be on 21/12/2012 'conehead'?

This is what cosmic-ray enthusiasts should be trying to prove.

If you can do this Keiran … wipe the dust from your cubby-hole and make way for a Fields or Nobel.
(Hint: remove your head from up your hind-quarters first, it should clear the way for any remaining neurones to function).

This is something that will blow AGW out of the water. Until you can do that, no other theory can come close.

For anyone still looking …

If we take anthropogenic CO2e out of the equations over the last 200 yrs as a driver of this current warming period, nothing else can explain it – not Solar, not cosmic-rays, not Milankovich cycles, not even Keiran’s flatulence.

"Cosmic ray enthusiasts" ...... what a joke Q&A. Well I'm probably an enthusiast to people with poor reasoning skills, faulty scientific understanding of cloud cover effects and one who arrogantly prefers the pulpit to proper debate.

Now it seems you are into weird astrology and nonsense prophecies so I'll leave you to that one. CO2 will be shown to be the weak GHG that it really is and cloud forcing by far the most economical explanation. Clouds do not just respond passively to climate changes but take an active part in the forcing, in accordance with changes in the solar plasma field that varies the cosmic-ray flux.

The article is about the philosophy of climate change inaction – we have gone off topic (not unusual on OLO) and I have obviously contributed to that.

Keiran (looks like just you and me), my last post takes a couple of quotable quotes out of Tolstoy’s philosophical classic “Anna Karenina” and is directed at your musings on cosmic-rays.

In context:

If: your thoughts are that,

And: that’s all there is in it,

Then: all that is humbug.

I don’t mean any harm by the use of the vernacular (Oz or French) as I trust you will understand. You know science and philosophy go back a long way Keiran, and I appreciate your interest in both. So let’s continue with an open mind, deal?

Climate change researchers are not claiming scientific proofs. They (even the ‘cosmic-ray enthusiasts’) present papers that have been extensively reviewed (and can be questioned) such as the thousands that make up the foundation of the WMO and UNEP reports of the IPCC.

You are correct; water vapour is a powerful GHG. Clouds are a very important component of the complex climate modeling algorithms and these models (about 12) are quite good at replicating climates when compared to observed events.

Clouds are involved in both positive and negative feedbacks as you know. The super-computers that researchers have access to today make ‘climate modeling’ a lot easier and have been instrumental in achieving the results that have been realised. Climate change isn't just about models though.

Notwithstanding, you would also be aware that water vapour has a comparative life of about 10 days in the atmosphere – precipitating out as rain and snow.

You should also be aware that CO2 has a comparative life span of 100 years.

I am sure you can see the problems if we spew carbon into the troposphere more than what the oceans and terrestrial biosphere can naturally absorb - a warmer world has more air moisture.

BTW, I am not into astrology, but astronomy interests me.

Would you like a link to consider your solar plasma field and cosmic-ray flux?

Q&A, the shonky IPCC organisation in fact could use astrology and the position of the planets to probably provide more accurate climatic predictions. Seriously that's how bad it has become.

Your arrogant Dr. Pierre has no idea when he refers to solar/cosmic science as one for "enthusiasts" when in simple fact he has no understanding of how the albedo effect works with clouds. With such a misunderstanding what we have in effect today is AGW being just a new age wrapper for the revival of the pre-Copernican geocentric model of the universe where the sun and other objects circle the earth, are regular, constant and unchanging while the earth at the centre is stable and solid .... unless someone changes it.

Copernicus may have presented a model of a heliocentric system with the sun at the centre and NASA solar physicists may have a similar heliocentric focus that ignores cosmic events .... i.e. the importance of cosmic rays.

What's the betting that some advocacy/political group will develop a way to blame solar variability on human activity and want to tax us to fix it?

There is a misunderstanding Keiran, the IPCC don’t do the scientific research as you imply. They correlate all the scientific papers published (even astronomical cosmic-ray ones), have independent scientists review the findings, and have other independent scientists prepare reports (e.g. AR4) for the commissioning bodies - the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

Anyway, for the sake of argument and to stay focussed, let’s leave the IPCC out of it.

Also, for the sake of argument, let’s not get bogged down with semantics – enthusiasts, alarmists, deniers, cretins, whatever – and most importantly, let’s not introduce personal attacks on people we don’t even know.

Albedo is very well understood in the scientific community.

Now,

Cosmic-ray ‘proponents?’ postulate that when cosmic rays interact with the Earth's atmosphere (especially the low level clouds), they create ions of varying strength and charge. These ions they then suggest contribute to the formation of dense clouds, blocking the Sun's rays and reducing the effect of heating. The connection between the Sun's 11-year cycle of sunspot and solar wind activity and the Earth's deflection of cosmic rays was offered up as a possible natural explanation for global warming.

In July last year, a paper titled “Cosmic Rays and Global Warming” was published at the International Cosmic Ray Conference held in Mexico.

http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/0706/0706.4294v1.pdf

According to this research, the above hypothesis completely avoids clouds at other altitudes (as Raypierre was alluding to). This is surprising because cosmic ray ionization should increase with altitude. Cosmic rays should be intercepted earlier by the atmosphere and turned into clouds, not down at the lowest altitudes. If cosmic rays were to blame for global warming, you would expect the exact opposite, with more high-altitude clouds.

It can't be ruled out, but it's pretty unlikely – again as Raypierre pointed out.

CR proponents also suggest cosmic rays will create ions that turn into water droplets. Researchers have found that the rate of ion production is too low to generate the number of water droplets required to create clouds.

Cont’d

Cont’d

CR proponents also believe the cosmic ray/cloud cover/global warming natural cycle as the interaction between the Sun's 11-year cycle of solar activity and the magnitude of cosmic rays that reach the Earth's atmosphere. As the solar wind increases, it buffets away cosmic rays that would reach the Earth's magnetosphere.

Now, ionized particles are channelled towards the Earth's poles (which is why we see the beautiful auroras at the highest latitudes). If cosmic rays were causing additional cloud cover, you would expect the greatest variations around the poles. This just isn't the case; in fact, the opposite is true.

Furthermore, there's known to be a 6-14 month delay between the decrease of cosmic ray activity, and the increase in the number of sun spots. Based on these cycles, research has found almost no correlation between the rise and fall of sun spots, and levels of cloud cover.

Research has estimated that less than 15% of the 11-year cycle warming variations are due to cosmic rays and less than 2% of the warming over the last 35 years is due to this cause.

If scientists wanted to study the interaction between radiation and cloud cover they could always perform a highly unethical experiment: release a tremendous amount of radiation into the atmosphere and see what it does to clouds in the environment.

Unfortunately, that experiment has already been performed... accidentally: the Chernobyl disaster.

In April, 1986 the reactor released a huge, huge dose of radioactive particles into the atmosphere. If radiation increases cloud cover, there should have been clouds surrounding the facility for weeks.

Guess what, there was no evidence of unusual cloud cover surrounding the facility after the disaster.

Keiran, I really don’t want to believe that we (humanity) have been so stooopid and have caused this latest round of GW … that is why I am so interested, and have been so sceptical. But the more I research, the more convinced I am of AGW.

I want to believe in the link I suggested to you,

http://www.viewzone.com/milkyway.html

But, until the astronomers prove it, then it is for nowt.