RPG - its true that the side with the better funding has won, for the moment. Although the truth must eventually come out it may be perhaps two or three years before the present cooling trend in temperatues becomes undeniable. The trend looks like its about to reverse, temporarily, due to the El Nino cycle (just as la nina caused temps to drop sharply last year). Once that works it way through the system and, perhaps, temps drop back to below where they are now, then a lot of scientists will suddeny find that they never really agreed with global warming.. funny that.

Mark

<< The US national academy of science gave Mann an out - I forgotten the details >> ... funny that.

<< the IPCC rightly dropped it as no longer defensible. >> Wrong, actually – the so called ‘hockey stick’ is in the AR4, together with about a dozen others, all from different researchers and different proxies ... funny that.

<< They had to fall back on the use of computer models >> No they didn’t, you obviously don’t understand how science works ... funny that.

Now, the jewel in the crown:

<< Although the truth must eventually come out it may be perhaps two or three years before the present cooling trend in temperatues becomes undeniable. The trend looks like its about to reverse, temporarily, due to the El Nino cycle (just as la nina caused temps to drop sharply last year). Once that works it way through the system and, perhaps, temps drop back to below where they are now, then a lot of scientists will suddeny find that they never really agreed with global warming >>

So Mark, given your understanding of time series analysis, natural variability, radiative transfer and the enhanced greenhouse effect:

Do you think that this next El Nino would lead to a higher GMT than in 1998 (notwithstanding 2005 was up with it)?

If so, why?

If not, why not?

________

Houelle,

Sorry about this, but it's an OLO policy that whenever there is an article about, well ... anything - Col is automatically and unreservedly given 1st dibs at the mantra "Socialism by Stealth".

An interesting article in New Scientist recently (16May 2009).

It has some interesting implications for scientific certainty/conclusions – especially re the Climate Change “debate” – see if you can guess why!

heading: Don’t be so sure that our universe is flat
Thanks in part to the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) satellite, which revealed the density of matter and dark energy in the early universe, MOST ASTRONOMERS ARE CONFIDENT THAT THE UNIVERSE IS FLAT. But that view is now being questioned by Joseph Silk at the University of Oxford and colleagues who say it’s possible that the WMAP observations have been misinterpreted.
In a paper accepted for publication in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society (www.arxiv.org/abs/0901.3354), they took data from WMAP and other cosmology experiments and analyzed it using Bayes’s theorem, which can be used to show HOW THE CERTAINTY ATTACHED TO A PARTICULAR CONCLUSION IS AFFECTED BY DIFFERENT STARTING ASSUMPTIONS.
Using modern astronomers’ assumptions, which presuppose a flat universe, they calculated the probability that the universe was in one of three states: flat, positively curved or negatively curved. This produced a 98 per cent probability that the universe was indeed flat. When they reran the calculation starting from a more open-minded position, however, the probability changed to 67 per cent, making a flat universe far less of a certainty than astronomers generally conclude.
“It’s a reasonable assumption that the universe isn’t entirely flat,” Silk says, ADDING THAT THE CALCULATIONS REVEAL HOW STRONGLY ASTRONOMERS PREJUDGES CAN AFFECT CONCLUSIONS…Silk says astronomers need top achieve a 99.9999 per cent level of confidence on the flat universe high enough that the case starts to look compelling no matter what the starting assumptions are.

Unlike the usual sort of scare, such as over vaccination or fluoridated water, the more people know about the science behind AGW, the more likely they are to believe in it. This big survey from the earth science journal Eos shows that 97% of active climatologists support AGW

http://tigger.uic.edu/~pdoran/012009_Doran_final.pdf

While the truth isn't decided by majority vote, this degree of consensus only leaves 3 logical alternatives:

1. The scientists are correct. To the best of our current knowledge, there is a real threat from AGW.

2. The scientists are telling the truth as they see it, but they are mistaken because they are overlooking something important. How likely is it that you can imagine an influence from solar variation, volcanos, cosmic rays, dodgy computer models, etc., but the people who know more about atmospheric physics and chemistry than anyone else are too dumb to see it? If there really is a devastating counterargument, why isn't it appearing in journals such as Science or Nature on the way to giving its originator a Nobel Prize, and not in some obscure denialist blog aimed at the general public? As Q&A and sources like realclimate.org point out, the climatologists have considered all of these factors. It is amusing that you denialists are usually willing to respect nuclear scientists and engineers - because they happen to be saying things that you want to hear.

3. The scientists are lying for nefarious reasons of their own. This implies a vast global conspiracy, because the scientists who live amd work in Russia, China, India, Brazil, and elsewhere, where they have different cultures, religions, funding arrangements for science, etc., etc., all have to keep their lies consistent. Furthermore, they have to be able to squelch any young scientist anywhere in the world who might be tempted to break ranks and go for a Nobel Prize plus unlimited grant money by conclusively discrediting AGW. Where is the evidence for such a conspiracy? It might be more credible to stick to showing that the Moon landings were faked or that there are alien bodies hidden in Area 51.

Divergence,
I beg to differ.

You claim: “This big survey from the earth science journal Eos shows that 97% of active climatologists support AGW”.

But the survey you cite tells a different story:
10,257 were surveyed – of these only 3146 responded (i.e. 30%)
[hardly the voice of the scientific community, or even, the ‘active’ climatologists subset of it ]

Those that did respond answered two ––pretty ambiguous—questions:

1) When compared to pre-1800s levels, do you think that mean global temperatures have generally risen, fallen or remained the same ? [ 96.2% of the 3146 answered ‘risen’]
My questions about this question are :
i) “when compared to pre-1800s” – does the --PRE-- bit extend to the mid-Pliocene when the earths temperates were much warmer than presently?
ii) Is a measure of 200- 220 years sufficiently broad, AND has the trend always been on one direction during this time span?

2) Do you think human activity is a significant contributory factor in rising mean temperatures? [ 97.4% of the 3146 answered yes]
i) My question about this question is: what is their definition of ‘significant’?

I would have expected any competent scientist – IF THEY TOOK THE SURVEY SERIOUSLY (?) – to have had the same queries!

You listed three scenarios that might invalidate the popular position on AGW –I can think of a fourth:

4. Those --religiously committed -- to the new faith haven’t yet read this book:http://www.amazon.com/Extraordinary-Popular-Delusions-Madness-Crowds/dp/051788433X
(Incidentally, tell them Horus sent you --they may give you a discount --I send a lot of snake oil sales persons their way!)

Divergence

You won't be able to stop some people cherry-picking the data, as we have seen. When pressed, they always seem to side-step, change the goal posts or move to a different the playing field altogether.

It is worth noting that whatever happens, it won't be the scientists who decide - it will be the politicians, captains of industry and their respective bean-counters - that is where the real debate is, and it is global.

Your 3 points are logical. Horus' 4th is not - his is predicated on science being a faith based religion.
Clearly, whoever thinks this does not understand how science works.

It is disturbing when people repeat the same old distortions and misrepresentations time and time again. I am not calling these people pathological liars - some are certainly not stupid. Their recalcitrance appears to be founded on some ideological perspective.

Having said that, there are clearly some 'whackos' out there who are just plain anti-science.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-science