Remember the one about 97% of scientists agreeing that we were contributing to global "warming", since changed to climate "change"? Alan L. Urban, writing in The Spectator, reckons the claim was "so fraudulent that it should classified as crime".

Mr. Urban states that the survey that came up with this 'fact' was a two question job, emailed to 10,257 scientists. Of these, 3,146 responded. Many believed that the poll was "fundamentally flawed" and could be "misinterpreted"; others declined to complete the poll because of "mistakes".

96% of respondents were North American. Of these, 77 were selected by the researchers, and 75 of these agreed with the proposition. There's their 97% - unrelated to the 3,146 respondents,

Enough said?

ttbn

unfortunately the current crop of academia has dumbed people down enough by repeating lies so often that its accepted as truth. Demonising anyone can think has been the tactic of the regressives. Whether it is calling someone born with a penis a girl, gw or ' marriage equality', Islam is the religion of peace etc, the dumbed down crowd like getup and the media seem incapable of thinking.

ttbn, oddly though I've seen entirely different versions of the rebuttal of the number.

The version I'd seen was based on abstract analysis of published papers

eg The tone of much of this document http://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/

I'm still concerned that much of the Consensus talk is self reinforcing by creating a situation where those challenging the "consensus" view are on the outer so unlikely to be game to try and publish and likely not to be published if they do.

I'm also highly sceptical of a lot of the political add ons and tactics used to push agenda's with Climate Change as a tool for social engineering/wealth redistribution etc but suspect that's just the way the activists operate and it does not necessarily make all the science bad.

Clearly some big problems with the way what are often political bodies (or groups that rely on political bodies for funding) have operated but again I'm nervous about the approach of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

R0bert

Too add to the absurdity some people in positions of power want to make it a crime to deny climate change is real.

Hi Robert,
The dangers of "groupthink" and confirmation bias are inevitably real, but in general the scientific community has a pretty good set of bullshite filters.

A bigger problem is the few groups who are funded by vested industrial and political interests to muddy the waters. We've seen a couple of those on this site in recent weeks.

Over time, if there is a problem with a consnsual interpretation of scientific results, or if the results themselves are poorly derived it will be noticed and the faults will be rectified.

If only our resident Henny Pennies could apply the same model to their own "reasoning" process...

Runner,

All true. Only conservatives are able to see through the lies and resist the rot. The trouble is, most people rely only on the seriously Left media for their information on everything. For the Left, the end justifies the means, and they will do anything to gain control. Until we have so-called conservative politicians with the guts and the brains to stand up to them, we are in a losing position. Irrespective of what governments call themselves these days, the Left is setting the agenda. Since Howard, the supposed-to be Right side has made such fools of themselves that they are not worth supporting. There is a complete vacuum of commonsense and duty.

Incidently, AEMO has now found that the SA premier was lying when he said that the windmills were not responsible for the blackout: they damn well were.

Just by way of clarification, there were in fact two 'studies' that came up with the 97% number. The first was the survey ttbn refers to where ~10000 were surveyed, ~3000 replied and then a mere 79 considered. ( If they used to full 3000 replies they would have got a much lower number than 97%).

The questions asked were:
1. “When compared with pre-1800s levels, do you think that mean global temperatures have generally risen, fallen, or remained relatively constant?”
2. "Do you think human activity is a significant contributing factor in changing mean global temperatures?"

Most sceptical scientists would answer yes to these questions which is why the questions have been called flawed and why many of the 10000 didn't take part.

The other survey was a subjective analysis of 10000 or so articles published on global warming. This is the Cook study and has been comprehensively debunked. On one reading the results of this showed that less than 1% of articles explicitly endorsed the consensus view.

Hi mhaze,
Science rarely "explicitly endorses" anything. The scientific model is to try to falsify, not to confirm. If a series of properly rigorous scientific studies fail to show that a a particular interpretation is false, it is taken as a "paradigm", which can be reasonably assumed to be sound until something comes along that disproves it.

In some cases there are several ways to interpret results, in which case the scientific effort is made to try to narrow things down.

At no point does a scientist suggest that anything is settled, simply that the balance of probabilities falls one way or another.

I'm of the view that the earth's systems are too large and complex to be fully understood with current models, which is the view of virtually everybody who has any understanding of complex systems. However, some facts are not in dispute, so it makes sense to take a "worst case" interpretation until we know more.

Of course, for those might only have a few years left to live, or have a vested interest, short-term interest might predominate.

Think of the couple having sex in their car: if they happen to knock the handbrake off and the car starts rolling, the short-term reward of finishing the job might take precedence over stopping the car from rolling backwards over a cliff, although the afterglow might be spectacularly short-lived...

Craig,

When I used the term "explicitly endorsed" it was because the Cook paper also used that exact terminology.

"At no point does a scientist suggest that anything is settled"

So all those people, including the IPCC, who've been telling us that the science is settled aren't really scientists? Good to know.

Addressing your car bonking analogy....when the car rolls back maybe , rather than over a cliff, it'll end up in a daisy strewn meadow which might enhance the moment of ecstasy. Given that either result is a long way into the future, maybe they could continue to screw while occasionally checking the status of the car's movements and only engage in coitus interruptus if the cliff comes into distant view.

The really silly thing is they talk about consensus, which has nothing to do with science. Another thing is that many of the Left believe that scientists are not like we mere mortals, that they are incapable of lying, cheating, and defrauding for the own financial benefit. Some of the home truths that have come out about the climate scam should have disabused them of that idea, but that doesn't seem to have happened, and the rort continues.

I haven't read the report you refer to, mhaze, but I would be extremely surprised if any scientist anywhere has used the expression "the science is settled" with respect to some interpretation of evidence. The science may well be "settled" in terms of definitive facts, however. There is no dispute that CO2 absorbs near IR; there is no dispute that there is more CO2 in the atmosphere; there is no dispute that various streams of evidence point to an increase in CO2 dating from the widespread use of fossil fuels; there is no dispute that burning coal and oil causes CO2 to form.

Those are examples of things that are settled. There are lots of other things that are settled, however, the response of the earth's systems to the various stimuli is not yet settled and therefore the long-term impacts are not yet fully understood, which is another way of saying "not settled".

As for the couple in the car, if they are certain that there is nothing nasty that can happen if the car rolls away, then by all means they should let the fun continue. However, if they rely on landing in a pleasant meadow by chance without having made certain of where they're going, they'd best have a good insurance policy.

When was the last time you set out for somewhere new without having had a good look at the map?

Craig

" I would be extremely surprised if any scientist anywhere has used the expression "the science is settled" with respect to some interpretation of evidence. "

Well you be wrong. Here's but one example of myriad others. Note that Mann lists all those scientific organisations that say that it is settled.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZ2cCPRS-Q8

Strangely, although you don't think anything's settled, you do think there is a map showing where we're going!!

mhaze,
Ah, now I see the confusion: you think that because these people have come to a conclusion that the climate is inevitably going to change, based on the indisputable facts we discussed earlier, that this means they are behaving unscientifically.

Nothing could be further from the truth. For example, I can reliably predict that if I puncture my tire, then it will eventually become unusable, even if I can't predict exactly when and where. Therefore, if I find a nail stuck in the tread, it's in my own best interest to fix it as soon as possible rather than driving on, hoping to blind luck that it hasn't penetrated sufficiently far to cause problems.

Sometimes maps can be very vague indeed and still give us useful guidance. An early map based on vague descriptions and observations of effects might label a part of the vast unknown with "here be dragons", representing a part which is unknown in detail, but which is known to be dangerous based on the fact that those who travel there don't return.

Climate science has a map with some quite well-defined "dragons" that should be regarded as definitively dangerous, but still needing exploration. In other words, we know where NOT to go, which is down the path of continuing reliance on fossil fuels. The fact that these are problematic is "settled", even if there are details to be properly understood.

And all of this is a red herring, because whether the climate is changing or not, it makes economic sense to move to a source of energy that doesn't involve digging a limited and finite supply of valuable highly reduced carbon out of the ground and burning it.

The region around Kalgoorlie, which is now a patchwork of scrubby saltmarshes and semi-desert was a heavily wooded plain back in the 1900s? It was all cleared to make fuel and props for the mines. Kalgoorlie still exists because the mining industry recognised it needed to find a new technology.

Those who can't adapt to change die out.

A way to describe how a scientific community are paid not to correct probable lies are to examine other scientific lies.
My argument why there are no space probes mentioned on news media.

Space probes landing on Mars, probes taking pictures while passing solar system planets… Pluto 7.5 billion miles from Earth, radio wave transmitted to Earth, is ridiculous. Space probe news stories are all lies to entertain believe what their told Neanderthals; Propaganda for badly educated emotionally driven simpletons moving society forward advancing science.

Viking I&II probes sent out into space, said after passing planets to continue travelling out into space never to return, probes are defying the Sun’s gravity, pulling mass towards the Sun. Hayley’s Comet returns roughly every 70 years orbiting the Sun going back out into outer regions of the Solar System. Earth technology has not overcome gravity.

Government prescribed curriculum schools by government law, take in aged 5 years children whom are using Neanderthal emotional intelligence decision making capabilities, that children “could have” over many years eventually guided their human brains onto a pathway of advancing Homo-Sapient intelligent learning. What school teachers forced curriculum education gives society are dog like emotional ball chasing football loving low level specialised to perform limited behaviours intelligence Neanderthals.

Government curriculum prescribed schools are stopping children’s human intelligence from progressing into rationalising information that affects their lives. Young adults having recently left education systems that guide themselves onto addictive substance abuse: alcohol; medicating drugs; illegal drugs. Young adults have an irrational desire to feel stimulated pleasure on participating in and/or watching ball chasing/hitting/kicking games should highlight the intelligence capability for real intelligent people to realise the poor intelligence of a large percentage portion of human society.

I soon made associations with information most people are aware of, yet to place all the information into one realisation that space probes are lies, for most people is very difficult. For me to express to traumatised by education listeners using above and below information that space probes never existed, listeners become defensive, often angry as though they were resistant to learning something more difficult to understand than previously understood. Also resistant to being proven to have been wrong in what had been felt to be believed.

Earth travels around the Sun at around 67,000 Miles-Per-Hour. Any probe being sent out into space moving away from the Sun at speeds fast enough not to be pulled back towards the Sun by the Sun’s gravity. Probes must exceed 67,000 mph, add said to be 26,000 mph to leave Earth’s gravity. Sending space probes out into space using Earth’s 67,000 mph direction Earth is travelling around the Sun speed. Space probes travelling away from the Sun could be estimate to be traveling at 93,000 mph.

One Mars year is 686.93 Earth days, 1.88 Earth years. At Earth’s closest distance to Mars, 55 million kilometres, Sun’s light takes 10 minutes longer to reach Mars after light has passed Earth. Radio waves travel at the speed of light 186,000 miles per second.

I conclude Mars and Earth planets travelling around the Sun, periods of 1.7 Earth years between closest distances for both planets to come to that 10 minute light distance apart from each other. Periods where Earth and Mars are not within close distance from each other… the Sun’s charged particle noise increases as radio waves travelling between transmitters and receivers need to pass closer to the Sun.

Probes travelling to Mars would need to reach Mars after traveling for media reported said 7 months on 2016 October 20 probe reaching Mars. Probes arrive at Mars at the correct orbiting speed to hold orbit around Mars. If no orbiting was used, probes would need to slow down in Mars unknown atmosphere, deploy a parachute, slowly descending on Mars.

Probes travelling through space speed after leaving Earth on the way to Mars would be difficult to calculate over 7 months while travelling to Mars point of entering Mars orbit. Space has no atmosphere to allow rocket engines to have significant thrust to slow and/or speed up probes to arrive at planned location at the correct time planets and comets are speeding through space at many thousands of miles per hour. Every calculation pertaining to everything has a percentage of error. Sending probes towards far away planets and smaller comets at speeds to reach planned destinations having the smallest miscalculation which I say would be impossible to calculate correctly. Believing media animation presentations on space probe missions succeeding or failing, never happened.

Radio waves do not travel long distances outside Earth’s magnetic field in space. Sun’s charged particles noise will destroy radio waves after transmitted radio waves drop blow low decibel levels into noise decibel levels. The millions of miles of Sun’s magnetic field charged particles noise radio waves need to travel through to be received on Earth will further destroy transmitted radio waves.

Large parabolic dishes supposedly receiving billions of miles away space probe radio waves are more propaganda: convincing HSC leavers to pursue outer space technology university studying; most media news stories are boring to listen to, that many listeners only bother to watch boring murder and political news stories, watchers are waiting for the carrot on the stick, more interesting entertainment, science and technology, driverless motor vehicles reasons for spending time watching news stories. For the same reason selected media consumer product advertising methods sells products, selling boom bust capitalism and poor political democracy corporate laws that failed to safe guard citizens wealth. Advancement in science stories aids public acceptance of life’s lowering standards.

Mobile phone users should be familiar with signal strength bar scales on mobile phones; laptops and computer dongles network icons. Mobile phone towers are more sensitive in receiving radio waves and send out more powerful radio waves than pocket mobile phones. Distances between phone towers and mobile devices are limited to a few kilometres. The distances said photos were being sent back from Pluto are 7.5 billion miles.

When radio decibel levels fall under static noise decibel levels, radio waves are soon destroyed by static charged particle noise. Radio waves transmitted as a focused beam will merely spread as though a bull horn speaker was used.

Large parabolic dishes on Earth will not be able to receive radio waves within any significant distance from Earth.

22,000 miles above Earth’s surface, Clark Orbit satellites sends television radio wave signals to wide footprint areas using focused parabolic dishes. At 3 gigahertz frequencies, large parabolic dishes are used to overcome static noise. At 12 gigahertz, dishes need only use smaller dishes as 12 gigahertz is above a stated 10 gigahertz end of static noise, lower static noise decibels reduces parabolic dish size. Down side technical issues with transmitting at higher frequencies are that higher frequencies decline decibel levels over shorter distances radio waves will travel, the more power to transmit higher frequency radio waves will be required to make up the lost short distance high frequency radio wave travel.

Animated space probes seen as small in size often have no significant transmitting devices seen.

I have placed a similar post on a website many months ago. One reply post suggested NASA technology would overcome all problems. Well if NASA was overcoming all problems, NASA must be having help from a magical god. NASA could be getting help from the Devil.

I number of people who realise lies, may be taken in by future media assurances that if listeners do what’s asked to avoid a future end of time market crash, listeners will save themselves from considerable loss of wealth. Media’s bad advice to listeners to sell property during repressed market prices, listeners losing considerable wealth.
The media are little more that entertaining confidence trickery.

Much of the what politicians and media are presenting has much to do with distracting human boredom towards limited information that often can't be proven incorrect.

What politicians do and say behind closed doors can't be assumed as wrong, yet should be assumed as planned drama performances classroom intelligent dramas.

Climate Change dramas are set to go on forever. drama arguments on whether climate change is caused by humans or all more about the sun is doing won't be mentioned by media news. If the sun's involvement becomes a topic, media will be prompting listeners to think for themselves, rather than telling listeners what to believe in vague understanding headline shifting around statements.

steve101: hope this link clears some things up for you about how we send probes out into deep space- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravity_assist

I think most people would consider AGW science is settled because legislation was enacted to charge money for carbon emission.

Numerous politicians and their climate science advisors have said numerous times that the science is settled, when in reality that science is not settled.

Billions have however been milked from treasury and business and pockets and purses, when in reality climate science is nowhere near settled.

On one of the Jennifer Marohasy threads here on OLO a seemingly well educated poster repeatedly said there was consensus between 30,000 scientists about AGW. When challenged about the extra nought there was no reply but the 30,000 claim suddenly ceased.

JF Aus,
the science is "settled" to the extent that we know that burning valuable resources of highly reduced carbon is stupid.

You're on the wrong side of history, buck up your ideas.

Some of you might like to Google Ottmar (Otto) Edenhofer, economist and former official of the IPCC who, in 2010, made no bones about the fact that the cilmate scam is nothing to do with the environment, but all about redistribution of wealth.

And, have a look at Naomi Klein, Leftist write, who said: "It's not about carbon, it's about capitalism".

Two people, in favour of defrauding the world, who are actually honest.

ttbn,
Naomi Klein was right, the reason the world has been so slow to act on the horrendous waste of valuable carbon is that a few crony capitalists have been making so much money out of it.

Here's an interesting clip of that well known socialist agent provocateur Milton Friedman discussing a related topic; the distribution of ownership of national assets.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GEiRroLaHc

Craig Minns,

What do you mean, Craig, the "science is settled to the extent.........?
To what actual extent is CO2 or algae causing that SST anomaly?

History is being manipulated and so is science.
BS spin is being applied to science to an extent respect for honest science is dwindling.

There is dire urgent need for properly-adequate resources for genuine science to manage the entire water ecosystem of our planet and the weather and climate. Oceans dominate influence on weather and climate.

Presently available MEAGRE resources for genuine science are being used up by BS science.

I think I am on the leading edge side of history by coming forward with evidence of substance indicating nutrient pollution fed algae is overly warming areas of ocean and waterways.

To help back up relevant evidence, 4 days ago I bought a digital multimeter with a temperature PROBE, costing about $50 from Jaycar.

At about 2pm for the past 3 days, measurements in water and in algae in a 300 sq mm area of a pond showed warmth in algae plant matter.
Warmth in different algae species was a about half of one degree or up to one whole degree warmer than just the water, on those 3 slightly cloudy days.

I just went outside in drizzle to get you, Craig, the following practical measurement. You have observed my view on those OLO/ Marohasy threads and I now add this.

Today 23.10.2016 at Sydney there is low dense cloud linked to weather coming from the NW coast of Western Australia and the Indian Ocean.
Measurement of the same pond algae at 12.15pm today shows warmth of .2 of one degree C above the plain water temperature.

According to “settled” science, Is there categorically no warmth in algae matter that is inundating seas and ocean ecosystems?
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/02/100305-baltic-sea-algae-dead-zones-water/

There is need for genuine science to speak up under protection FROM a Royal Commission.

Ad hominem intimidation stifling or gagging climate evidence and cutting off resources for genuine scientists should be investigated and challenged.

Craig,

So you agree that it has nothing to do with the environment?

Irrelevant, JF Aus, the carbon resources are sufficiently valuable to make every effort to preserve them without any other justification required.

Hi ttbn,
I agree that Naomi Klein was correct in pointing out that the "debate" about climate change is a red herring and that the real problem is the short-term thinking of a few crony capitalists.

The smart capital has already backed renewables, in a clear example of evolution in action in the market.

Craig Minns

Your opinion of irrelevant posted there is an outright distraction from what I said.

There is much more present day value in real science human resources, if for example applied to harnessing sewage nutrient to viably produce algae for biofuel.

Is that also irrelevant?

I suggest drop the carbon rhetoric and act on reality and truth.
Right in front of me right now is a media report headed BITTER HARVEST.

The report refers to small scale farming and global food security that could be devastated by climate change.

Well evidence indicates natural food supply ecosystems of this planet are now already devastated but not because of carbon or CO2.
Such devastation does not have to be worldwide all at the same time as AGW implies.

Take a look at seafood dependent coastal people including at Haiti.

Marine animals are starving to death en-masse, the "canary in the coal mine" that proves ocean food devastation exists already.

Sewage and land use nutrient overload pollution is feeding algae that is already devastating world seafood and fertilizer supply and also ocean ecosystems linked climate of this planet.

The problem is not carbon.

Craig,

Fair enough, but did you read what Otto said? And, the real fuss is about carbon dioxide CO2, not carbon C.

The idea, though, is to rip money off the capitalists, and give it to the poor, which has always been the theme of the Left. It has never worked and it never will - except for the 'progressives', who will have all of us equally poor and beholden to them. Even totalitarian China is building more cheap, coal powered energy that is bringing more prosperity to dirt poor citizens. So is India. They are doing what we used to, but now seem ashamed of doing. The 'Tyranny of Guilt' I suppose. I'm no capitalist myself: always a wage-slave, but I never felt envious of the rich, nor guilty for what I was able to accumulate with the help of the capitalists.

JF,
All of those things are undoubtedly important, nobody would claim otherwise, but sorting those things out is not mutually incompatible with minimising the use of a scarce carbon resource. In fact, it would probably make it easier.

Hi ttbn,
carbon C is a very valuable resource. Making highly reduced carbon takes a lot of energy, which is why it releases a lot of energy when it oxidises. The C is an extremely valuable industrial resource. Would we burn gold or silver or copper?

The Chinese are preparing for a large population increase, I suspect. Increasing prosperity will inevitably lead to more demand for power. They're also building more renewable capacity than anyone else. They get it.

Nobody is trying to blame the capitalist class, ttbn, they're our best hope for the future. They just need to do more thinking about long-term rather than short-term plans and we need to let them.

Hi JF,
You might find this interesting.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-XOkVbkmd4

We Can Solve Algae | Ashlee Balcerzak | TEDxToledo

Here it is in Adelaide, late Spring, October 24, and I'm huddled over a bloody oil heater. Global warming, yeah right.

Yes, I know, one swallow doesn't make a summer, we shouldn't confuse weather with climate.

Does anybody recall a rather tepid discussion some time ago about massive tree-planting across the North ? i.e. where our largest-volume rivers are ? i.e. not that far from a thousand Aboriginal communities, where people are crying out for work ?

Imagine if half of those settlements got involved, permanently, in tree-planting ? After all, most have running water, therefore ability to install irrigation systems ? They could plant a few million trees a year, and full-time jobs would be permanently available in building systems of small reservoirs, nurseries, workshops, eventually timber mills ? Even the Toyota rangers could do something useful driving water trucks.

How much CO2 would a few million trees suck out of the atmosphere every year ? Could it match the amount of CO2 being put into the atmosphere by increased coal consumption ? Is there a sort of 'balance' between one and the other ?

Just asking.

Joe

I'm not sure Joe, but as I said to ttbn earlier, whether CO2 existed as a problem or not, it doesn't make any kind of sense to be digging up coal, oil and gas just to burn it and we should stop doing that as soon as we can.

Once it did, but now we know that carbon in a highly reduced form is extremely valuable industrial input for all sorts of things and that those uses are likely to explode as smart people do more work on things like polymer chemistry, graphene and other stuff that no doubt exists which I don't know anything about.

The air was a bit on the chilly side of comfy up here in Godzone country as well. All the hot air is obviously being drawn to Canberra.

Hi Craig,

Have now seen the above link Ted+ lecture.

Some scientists are saying nitrogen is the problem.
From farming savvy I understand the algae problem is from the total nutrient load, all the combined nutrients that make up the total load.

That lecture and budding scientist fail to address city and town sewage nutrient dumped daily into waterways.

Really the problem is all the food we eat, and human instinct to not notice our own waste and where it goes and what the outcome is.
Add to that the politics of it all, for example with sewage and water rates already being used on other government business.

From my understanding the solutions include interest free capital for governments to develop productive business and employment generating infrastructure to manage whole of water ecosystems - including the world ocean.

A huge focus like that is going to require honest scientists to engage in debate about consequences of inaction compared to opportunities from action.
For example, viably producing biofuel and more affordable fertilizer and feed from algae. It's likely the oil people don't want more fuel.

It seems obvious to me to reduce or prevent the nutrient overload going into the water ecosystem in the first place.
Wipe dinner plate food scraps into the bin for landfill.
Develop modern bioreactors for modern water treatment.
Retrofit older treatment plants.

It can be done and it must be done.

But right at the moment nobody seems to know how many honest scientists there are and where they are and if those honest ones will ever speak up.

Hi Craig,

My point was that, if enough trees get planted, industries can use as much coal as they like, it's a win-win situation ?

Apart from the fact that, down the track, those trees are harvested for furniture, house-frames, etc., and more trees re-planted, which would provide more permanent jobs for Aboriginal people on their land. And of course, this might make a dint in the thirty billion annual Indigenous welfare budget :) Win-win-win !

It's not rocket science !

Cheers,

Joe

The 97% claim is a fraudulent and elitist appeal to authority. To start with, nearly all the “97%” are not doing, and never have done, research on the question of what drives climate variation. Canadian Journo Donna Laframboise (Google her) has painstakingly debunked this figure by referring to the lack of scientific expertise of most of those included by the IPCC as “climate scientists”. But even among the tiny remaining minority purporting to study drivers of climate variation, one must discount all those who pretend to study the topic by showing correlations between temperature and CO2 concentration – correlations based on a very small elapsed time. To grasp the changes over the past 125000 years (still only a blip in the grand scheme of things), have a look at the results of the O-18/deuterium isotope data unearthed (or uniced) at the Vostok station in Antarctica:
https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/globalwarming/paleobefore.html

These data, describing times almost exclusively prior to our species having the effrontery to build a scientific and industrial revolution which AGW cultists wish had never happened and ask us to reverse, show CO2 concentrations FOLLOWING temperature changes far greater than the two or three degrees a century that has them pushing real issues off the table and going on as if the sky is falling down.

The number of scientists actually studying the drivers of temperature variation (and therefore worth describing as “the science”) can be counted on the fingers of one hand. Names that come to mind include Nir Shivav of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Henrik Svensmark of the Danish National Space Institute in Copenhagen.

the warmist religion has used the same fallacies as evolutionist have used for decades with their hopelessly flawed pseudo science. The science is however settled. Yeah!

//How much CO2 would a few million trees suck out of the atmosphere every year ?//

Lots. But the thing is, they're really only carbon sinks whilst they're growing. Once they stop growing they're carbon neutral, and when they decompose they release almost all of the carbon they've absorbed back into the atmosphere. Over the life-cycle of a tree (let's say a hundred years or so), they're effectively carbon neutral.

//Could it match the amount of CO2 being put into the atmosphere by increased coal consumption ? Is there a sort of 'balance' between one and the other ?//

There is indeed a sort of 'balance', although most scientists prefer the term 'equilibrium' because it sounds cooler.

The equilibrium we are interested is the rate of CO2 production vs. CO2 absorption: and we are pumping it out a lot faster than even a comitted global re-forestation program can cope with - and good luck convincing some parts of the world that they should make trees, not war.

But please don't stop planting trees. Trees may not be that useful overall, but they are better than no trees. And they're nice. They give us shade, and homes for cute furry animals, and vile blood-sucking parasites (I had a tick removed from my scrotum recently. It was unpleasant), but mostly they're lovely. If you find two the right distance apart you can string up a hammock, so that's an added bonus.

//My point was that, if enough trees get planted, industries can use as much coal as they like, it's a win-win situation ?//

No.

But even assuming we could plant that many trees and they actually helped, still no. Because you're still going to run out of coke. I don't mean the horrid fizzy brown stuff that comes in bottles, or the horrid white stuff that comes in the noses of company executives. I mean the horrid black stuff you use to make steel. There's a finite supply and you can't make steel from trees. You're really going to miss steel when she's gone, Joe. If you live that long. If not, who cares? Throw some more coke on the fire, it's cold out there.

As a practicing scientist for some time, I'm amazed at the lack of actual science going on here.
It seems no one actually is numerate, or interested in a contest of facts. It's just fakery.

hi Craig,

Yeah, you might be right. But hey, what if trees weren't just planted in order to leave them to grow old and die, but maybe, somehow, used. Trees, used, you may say ? How on earth ? Indeed, but we have to rack our brains: how about for furniture, house frames and panels, etc., all the sorts of things it has been used for over the millennia, except of course to burn ? Sandalwood excepted :)

Yeah, 'equilibrium' sounds heaps cooler. Scientists are so cool.

I was sort of thinking in terms of billions actually: across the four thousand kilometres of the North, with extra rainfall as the climate warms, we (or at least Aboriginal 'communities' across there)could be planting, say, an extra kilometre-wide belt, over the next hundred years @ one tree per 50 sq m, i.e. 200 per hectare, i.e. twenty million per year. Or some permutation of all that.

I knows it's a silly question but anyway, how many trees do you need to suck, say, a tonne of CO2 out of the atmosphere over its lifetime ? Probably a tonne of trees ? How many is that - one ? two ?

Of course, another use for trees (or cast-off bits) is to be mulched fine and put on crops, so that tree carbon can be converted into food carbon, etc.

Sorry for crazy ideas, Craig :( But call it 'brainstorming'. Even an idiot can unwittingly come up with something.

Joe

Honestly, the clowns pretending to the knowledge and capacity to fine-tune the balancing of all the oxidation and reduction reactions in the world, are just too ridiculous for words.

And, as the instruments of their disinterested beneficence, they *just happen* to need the large-scale confiscation of property, and redistribution to socialist political favourites?

Why do the warmists just assume that everyone else is a stupid and dishonest as they are?

And obviously if the smart money is backing renewables, then there's no need for any policy action, is there?

Good comment JKJ, except that smart money is not so smart.