Dear WmTrevor,

Further to my last post to you and my response to your comment, "Did you notice this statement in your referenced paper? "Two special conditions of terrestrial landmass distribution, when they exist concurrently, appear as a sort of common denominator for the occurrence of very long-term simultaneous declines in both global temperature and atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2):"

That reference was to provide the source of the graph I am claiming shows there is no cause and effect relationship between the atmospheric CO2 levels and average global temp. It is a discussion, not a refereed journal study.

The refereed science references are the studies by CR Scotose (2002) and RA Berner (2001) that are the basis for the composite graph.

If qand a has a problem with the science i offer in my defence, let him attack it as a climate scientist.
Regards,
Geoffrey Kelley

Dear qanda,

I'm not sure there was too much enlightenment to be found amongst the inane, chest-beating/trolling Geoffrey and I have just engaged in, nor that either of us had much intention of seeking it, but at least the patriotism line seems to have been retired for now.

Not that I have too much problem with his graph even though it possibly hasn't appeared in any scientific journal. I'm sure that in the historical past temperature would have preceded CO2 rises. In fact that is what is being predicted for the thawing of the permafrost in our relatively near future. That this process would have occurred after ice ages is pretty obvious.

The graph is a combination of Scotese and Berner's figures put together by Scotese who uses terms like “To the consternation of global warming proponents “. Leaving that aside of course there are many factors to take into consideration when accounting for historical global temperatures including Milankovitch Cycles which deal with the changes in the Earth's orbit on temperature but Berner makes the point “This means that over the long term there is indeed a correlation between CO2 and paleotemperature, as manifested by the atmospheric greenhouse effect.”

All pretty simple really. If you add more CO2 the physics says, given all other things as equal, you will raise the temperature of the planet, up to a certain point that is but well past what we would be comfortable with.

Though I'm more than comfortable with the notion human activity may well be staving off the world slipping into another ice age is just seems we are determined to don a mink coat when a shirt would be adequate.

And of course there is a cost to donning the mink, it is just that people like Geoffrey want to socialise those costs rather than have the polluters pay.

Get a load of this:

http://joannenova.com.au/2013/01/monckton-returns-to-australia-book-now/

"Carbon tax, climate scam, Agenda 21: can democracy survive all three? Lord Monckton does due diligence".

"Lord" Monckton does due "ignorance" more likely.... : )

How wealthy industrialist deniers funnel their money to right-wing think tanks.

http://www.desmogblog.com/2012/10/25/key-findings-mashey-report-donors-trust

Science is certainly up against it on this one. It amounts to funding the spread of ignorance and conspiracy theory amongst a public who, all to often, is entirely receptive (even welcoming) of such rhetoric

Hello again Csteele,

Cobbling together graphs and taking them out of context is what ‘fake sceptics’ typically do to confirm their bias – and in Mr Kelley’s case, it is driven by politics, not science.

Mr Geoffrey Kelley is doing more damage to science (as a “trained scientist”) than he would ever understand, imho.

For example, as a "simple man" (his words) Mr Kelley plays the ‘cause and effect’ canard using graphs spanning tectonic and a geologic time series, of 100’s of millions of years … and then argues the lead/lag relationship between [CO2] and temperature of (say) only 1,000 yrs.

Even Dr Berner, in the paper Mr Kelley cites, says:

“there are substantial gaps in our understanding of how climate models distribute heat on the planet in response to CO2 changes on tectonic time scales”.

Yet this is exactly what Tim Ball & Co. has cobbled together.

Dr Berner concludes:

“it may be hazardous to infer that existing discrepancies between models and data cloud (distort) interpretations of future anthropogenic greenhouse gas projections.”

In other words, the (IPCC) projections could well prove accurate.

For Mr Kelley;

I do not have a problem with the science, you obviously do.

--

For others;

Mr Kelley assumes (although he doesn’t really know it) that ‘warmings’ and ‘coolings’ of the planet have a single cause ... in essence, his confusion over lead/lag times of [CO2] and its relationship to temperature.

Certainly, over tectonic time scales, the Milankovitch Cycles (MC) drive the warming trend (say 5,000 yrs) and cooling trend (say 80,000 yrs). Indeed, we are in a MC cooling trend right now, although over short time scales (hundreds of years) you would not think so.

Anyway, it is also wrong for Mr Kelley to assume (although he doesn’t really know it) that just because [CO2] does not cause the first thousand years (or so) of MC warming, nor the first thousand years (or so) of MC cooling, it cannot have caused any part of the many hundreds of years of warming trends, or cooling trends, in between.

FWIW, the [CO2] contributes about 30% to the glacial-interglacial warmings and coolings, or about 50% if you include other GHG’s like CH3 and NO2.

One thing is sure, and any “trained scientist” like Mr Kelley, would understand this;

Adding billions of tonnes of a heat trapping gas into the atmosphere increases the biogeochemical feedback mechanism to play havoc with the climate.