Wednesday
Jan182012
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Richard B at Nature
Jan 18, 2012 Climate: Sceptics Climate: other Richard Betts, writing at Nature's blog, says upholders of the climate consensus should talk to dissenters.
I think the only solution is to talk about the science as science, in the context of all its implications and also for its own academic interest – and talk about it to everyone irrespective of their position in the policy debate. This includes talking with sceptics, and not in defensive mode but as scientists willing to talk around the issue. It used to be the received wisdom that climate scientists should not engage with “sceptics” beause, it was said, it only wasted time and gave credibility to arguments that had already been countered many times before. In my view this is no longer a helpful strategy, if it ever was.
Reader Comments (231)
We wouldn't care about climate science or 'climate change science.'..Were it not for policy !!!
Curry's views on back radiation.
She has stated [comment here: http://judithcurry.com/2011/01/31/slaying-a-greenhouse-dragon/ ] that her view is the same as Pierrhumbert's:http://climateclash.com/2011/01/15/g6-infrared-radiation-and-planetary-temperature/
'The way that works is really no different from the way adding fiberglass insulation or low-emissivity windows to your home increases its temperature without requiring more energy input from the furnace. The temperature of your house is intermediate between the temperature of the flame in your furnace and the temperature of the outdoors, and adding insulation shifts it toward the former by reducing the rate at which the house loses energy to the outdoors. As Fourier already understood, when it comes to relating temperature to the principles of energy balance, it matters little whether the heat-loss mechanism is purely radiative, as in the case of a planet, or a mix of radiation and turbulent convection, as in the case of a house—or a greenhouse. Carbon dioxide is just planetary insulation.'
This is perfectly acceptable. What is not acceptable is to claim that the atmosphere acting as an impedance to IR transport can heat the planet by a positive feedback mechanism involving the accumulation of half the total S-B emitted radiation calculation neglecting Prevost Exchange as latent heat, which is what is really claimed. This indicates a failure to infer the difference between temperature, an intensive variable, and heat, an extensive variable: http://i56.tinypic.com/acdczn.jpg
Pierrehumbert also says this: 'Therefore, the energy of the photon will almost always be assimilated by collisions into the general energy pool of the matter and establish a new Maxwell–Boltzmann distribution at a slightly higher temperature. That is how radiation heats matter in the LTE limit.'
This is an assumption. As far as I can tell, there is no mechanism for this energy transfer. I suspect most if not all thermalisation is at second phases. My conclusion is that climate science is to physical science as painting by numbers is to fine art. Go back in time and people have made simplistic assumptions and are shutting down debate.
http://bobtisdale.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/figure-101.png The world is starting to cool significantly according to the only real measurement, the ARGO system, and this says CO2-AGW is much less than natural cooling. Therefore the IPCC models are probably very wrong.
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/dissentient
2. dissentient - disagreeing, especially with a majority
... expressing or consisting of a negation or refusal or denial
As randomengineer has posted at ClimateEtc
For all those tiring of mdgnn's bafflegab about back radiation, a proper treatment can be found at... Science of Doom! (Gixxer!).
Interested readers will find details of actual measurements of DLR and much, much more besides in a three-parter that addresses the following incorrect claims about back radiation:
- It doesn’t exist
- It’s not caused by the inappropriately-named “greenhouse” gases
- It can’t have any effect on the temperature of the earth’s surface
By SoD standards, much of this series is not at all hard to follow and I commend it to you all ;-)
BBD: I have never claimed that if you point a radiometer upwards, it measures no signal, only that this signal is simply a measure of temperature and emissivity. The only real measurement is the Up-Down signal.
Please desist from this misrepresentation and argue on the basis of established radiation physics which doe not allow thermodynamic work to be done on a hotter body by a colder body except by the application of external energy.
Physicists and engineers are taught this virtually from Day 1. It is clear that the softer sciences like climate and environmental miss it out, hence this tremendous scientific mistake.
And if SOD says otherwise, it too is mistaken!
To doubt is natural. To doubt is human. To doubt is scientific.
It is the epoused certainty of CAGW with all it tricks, fixes and revealed truths, coupled with the censoring of dissent and debate that has led to the public losing faith in climate science.
I get the irony but do climate scientists?
Richard
Scientists need to be willing to discuss uncertainties, controversies and technical challenges (ie: the interesting bits!) rather than just feeling they need to defend themselves against attack. Only by scientists being clearly seen to operate as scientists will trust be maintained – and this means being seen to explore the issues, challenge each other and not worry about how this will be seen or presented in the mitigation policy debate.
I've got some news for you. In other scientific disciplines it has always been done. It is only the amateurs that have found their way on to the gravy train that is climate that have not followed the usual scientific processes.
BBD
Wrong as usual. Radiometers measure a different band to the IR absorption of CO².
“Whenever a theory appears to you as the only possible one, take this as a sign that you have neither understood the theory nor the problem which it was intended to solve.”
Karl Popper
BBD
Yet again you refer to an anonymous blogger as the fount of all wisdom! How many timed a week do you refer us to the same blogger?
Bish:
Err, I don't think so, Bish. Unless I misunderstand Barry Woods, it's the fact that warmists and politicians have derived a 'policy' from the GoreMannian-level science on offer that is the problem. As Barry says, if it wasn't for the policy we wouldn't be bothered about the science - 'cos it would be just that, science, for the sake of it.
I've read the science of doom site on DLR: http://scienceofdoom.com/2010/07/31/the-amazing-case-of-back-radiation-part-three/
See figure 12,1 and notice that the textbook specifies radiation outwards, radiation inwards AND 'q rad net'.
I rest my case.
Richard Betts
"Scientists need to be willing to discuss uncertainties, controversies and technical challenges (ie: the interesting bits!) rather than just feeling they need to defend themselves against attack. Only by scientists being clearly seen to operate as scientists will trust be maintained – and this means being seen to explore the issues, challenge each other and not worry about how this will be seen or presented in the mitigation policy debate."
Thanks Richard, can't ask for a clearer statement but it does rather beg a question. What is the Met Office, a scientific establishment or a policy unit?
mydogsgotnonose Jan 18, 2012 at 2:34 PM
MDGNN - thank you for your previous replies on other threads.
As I understand the explanations of greenhouse warming, involving capture of surface emitted IR by greenhouse gasses and re-radiation of IR, 50% upwards and 50% downwards, do not contradict this. The net flow of power is always skywards. If so, where is the problem?
The error from pretending the cosmic background is 0 K is probably miniscule compared with other simplifications such as pretending the earth's temperature is uniform and then applying the T^4 formula. I don't see in what sense "the scientific error is immense" if the 2.7K is ignored any more than, for example, ignoring heat generated by terrestrial radioactivity.
Well, kudos to Richard for at least being a little interested in discussion.
However, to me this text is laced with suppositions e.g. repeating the 'arguments that had already been countered many times before' meme (well if you believed that - are you suggesting that the thousands of people in climatology in the UK should be laid off now?), and discussing strategies - i.e. 'this is no longer a helpful strategy' (what are we discussing here 'science' or tactics for the next political campaign?)
Richard's position is that of politician who assumes that the 'truth' is known and needs to find a communication 'strategy'. This is not science or anything that ought to be in Nature.
How about Richard or Nature publishing a verifiable prediction based a comprehensible scientific model? Wouldn't that be more straightforward than all this messaging activity?
Am I going mad, or is this new blog mediation resulting in some older posts appearing much later than newer posts, but appearing at the correct chronological place when they finally appear?
As a result, I've just read someone's response to a message that wasn't there until I did a refresh!
MDGNN:
Curry's views on back radiation .. is the same as Pierrhumbert's who says:
QED
Richard Betts' views are a most welcome, and refreshing, change of tack from his side of the fence. The fence that lies between those who are determined that governments must act now, or very soon, in draconian ways to avert a man-released-CO2-driven catastrophe and those who watch bemused, unconvinced by the arguments and the evidence so far presented for such urgency, and perhaps, like me, puzzled by the Climategate revelations of deviousness, concealment, and suppression of discourse by those who purport to be saving the world. Shouldn't such people be just a little nobler, more admirable, more open, more willing, indeed enthusiastic, to share data and insights and encourage debate. Indeed, should they not, all vanity aside, be the most delighted should anyone be able to show them misguided in their alarums? But no. What we see instead in those emails is a tawdry and unedifying display of the ignoble and the unimpressive.
Perhaps the bruisers and schemers starring in CG1 and CG2 have had their day, give or take a rearguard action or two? They have helped provide a scientific backing (or should than be 'front') for great successes by policy activists in the political sphere, such as the profoundly foolish Climate Change Act in the UK.
Perhaps the batons might soon be passed to a more civil wave of crusaders who will keep the mighty balls of intervention and aggrandisement based on climate scares rolling along.
Perhaps Mother Nature will continue to confound their 'projections', and continue to reveal her munificence with resources such as shale gas and methane hydrates. Resources which could well bring great progress to those happy lands free of the oppressive demons of fear and de facto control by greens.
Time will tell. If the climate continues to behave as if the additional CO2 doesn't matter very much, and if low cost energy resources make windfarms look like extravagant props from some hellish pantomime to more and more people, then we might do away with the fence and all get on with something more useful.
"Engaging" might be viable when climate scientists stop taking money from governments.
Do you think that climate (change) scientists could possibly understand the word "dissentient"? Perhaps we could ask UEA.
Martin A:
1. You can't use the S-B equation for a single body to establish the total net radiated energy transfer from that body.
2, You must do the calculation for all the bodies in line of sight using all the view factors [geometrical area including angular effects] for all emitter-absorber pairs and establish the net heat transfer in all modes, radiation, conduction and convection.
3, This means that the claim that half the absorbed IR radiation is emitted to the surface as if from an energy source, and is thermalised at the surface thus increasing its IR emission, is wrong, in particular because after iteration you get the imaginary positive feedback The detail is complex and I'm trying to work it out, as are others.
steveta_uk; 'It therefore causes the surface temperature in balance with a given amount of absorbed solar radiation to be higher than would be the case if the atmosphere were transparent to IR.',/i>
I don't disagree with that, only with the formulation of the problem such that the DLR is classified as available energy thus leading to positive feedback when it is supposedly converted to extra surface temperature.
Here’s an example. Assume that you have a clear sky, emissivity and absorptivity 0.2 and are on the beach in summer, air temperature 25°C, sand temperature 30°C and it’s windy. You put up a wind break and the sand temperature rises to 45°C. Assuming an emissivity for the sand of 0.85, the reduction of convection means that IR radiation has increased.
Do the sums assuming 20% is intercepted by GHGs and half that comes back and you’ve just increased DLR by 8.7 W/m^2 or 5.4 times AR4’s estimate of total net AGW.
The temperature rise is the UHI writ small. Not even the IPCC claims that the UHI causes global warming……..that would be to admit CO2 was far less important….;o)
I have a question for Richard. Why do you want to talk with us at all? We are a routed army, the scare stories have been accepted by governments, we are denied air time on the BBC and other MSM outlets, and are confined to blogs.
We have unearthed evidence of climate scientists manipulating data, and introducing hitherto unheard of statistics into papers that have erased the MWP, we have climate scientists emails showing them hiding declines, manipulating the peer review process, keeping papers our of journals they don't agree with, and getting editors fired for publishing papers the "cream" of the IPCC don't like.
We have proved that they won't share their data and code, and have evidence that behind the scenes, apart from being a nasty bunch of losers they are much more uncertain about the science than they have told the policy makers.
We have an investigative journalist who has discovered that the IPCC is overrun with scientists who in thrall to the WWF, and has appointed people who have no real experience as lead authors and co-ordinating lead authors.
We have shown that the predictions/projections coming from the climate science community are wildly inaccurate, and the world has not warmed significanlty since 1998.
And still the MSM ignore us, and governments are busy dismantling our energy infrastructure and risking economic armageddon on your advice.
So WTF do you want to talk to us about?
http://judithcurry.com/2012/01/18/2-perspectives-on-communicating-climate-science/#more-6719
Judith discussing the merits of Richard B's approach in comparison to Gavin S.
"If so called climate scientists cannot open themselves up and engage with others who don't hold the same religious beliefs as them then they will find themselves left behind."--Mailman
Most of them are already Left, and as for behind, I'll leave that up to you to ponder.
From a post I wrote at Curry's blog:
“Also, of course, it is important simply to increase the sum total of human understanding simply as an end in itself. Like art and music, gaining deeper insights into how the world around us actually works can enrich our lives and bring enjoyment.”
There are many good things that can be said about Richard Betts and his contributions to the debates over climate change. In the quotation above, he recognizes the main goal of science and its importance to our lives. Science exists to increase our human understanding and to satisfy our very powerful human curiosity. Physicists, pure scientists, are not like physicians who exist to relieve suffering and the debates over climate change should not assume that scientists are here to administer to our daily needs as physicians are.
Richard Betts can be counted on to take the high road in these debates. He occasionally engages in discussions at A. W. Montford’s website: http://bishophill.squarespace.com/. Though Dr. Betts is willing to criticize computer models “on the margin,” so to speak, he too is not yet willing to discuss candidly the fact that computer models do not meet the standards of scientific method.
Geronimo:
For that, and everything you said so eloquently before it in your comment: Well said!!!!
(I feel an Oscar Wilde moment - 'I wish I'd said that'. 'You will, Oscar, you will'.)
Richard Betts,
Excellent! Thanks. I thought that was an extremely constructive blog post.
Re: the many misrepresentations of MDGNN...
This is actually quite funny:
First, thanks again to steveta_uk Jan 18, 2012 at 12:33 PM for reminding us that:
- John O'Sullivan is not always a reliable source ;-)
- MDGNN deliberately obscured the fact that the quote he gave was NOT Curry, but in fact someone else (very naughty, that)
But I don't think I've ever seen a 'sceptic' deliberately misrepresent Spenser as MDGNN does. It beggars belief. Spenser is NOT 'wavering' on back radiation. This is utter BS and nonsense.
Here, for the interested, are entries from Spencer's own blog that make his position abundantly clear. And show MDGNN up for the egregious, knowing, serial misrepresenter that he very clearly is:
Spencer:
From Help! Back Radiation has Invaded my Backyard!
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2010/08/help-back-radiation-has-invaded-my-backyard/
More Spencer 'wavering' on back radiation here:
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2010/07/yes-virginia-cooler-objects-can-make-warmer-objects-even-warmer-still/
And here:
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2010/07/experiment-to-test-the-temperature-influence-of-infrared-sky-radiation/
Now perhaps we can have an end to this, eh?
Jan 18, 2012 at 3:54 PM | mydogsgotnonose
"This is an assumption. As far as I can tell, there is no mechanism for this energy transfer. I suspect most if not all thermalisation is at second phases. My conclusion is that climate science is to physical science as painting by numbers is to fine art. Go back in time and people have made simplistic assumptions and are shutting down debate."
Absolutely. All of so-called climate science is based on mere assumptions. No one has rigorously formulated the assumption that you mention here and tested it on Earth.
Their grandest assumption is that the equations for radiation transfer can be used to explain and predict all climate phenomena. Such an assumption requires that all natural processes, such as ENSO, PDO, you name it, must be treated as epiphenomena of radiation transfer (as an index in the models) and not as a natural process. That is a really useful assumption for dogmatists because it excuses them from actually doing empirical research on ENSO, PDO, and you name it.
Trenberth and his following are the only mainstreamers who dissent from this view. Trenberth believes that heat is being stored in the deep oceans. At least he sees that Earth is a set of physical processes that must be taken into account when relating radiation to temperature or heat. If there is heat stored in the deep oceans, something I doubt, then the radiation-only model used by other Warmists is violated by the fact that hugely significant portions of radiation from the sun must pass through natural processes that have their own dynamics.
BBD: I made an error about the quote and admitted it. Please apologise.
I then ascertained that Curry's view is the same as Pierrehumbert's and that's to accept DLR represents extra impedance to IR transmission on its way to space, but not to claim it's an energy source which provides positive feedback. As for Spencer, read the e-mail conversation I quoted.
If you can't understand the fundamental difference between impedance, a proper physical assessment, and an imaginary energy source, it apparently shows you are as muddle headed as appears to be the case of most of the other climate science claque.
Spencer is in my view wavering because he's had some heavyweight people on his blog, particularly a pukka physicist, telling him the facts.
MDGNN
After all this?? And you want me to apologise?
You are indeed inhabiting a parallel world.
BBD: read his blog and you'll see what I mean. He has been undergoing a long journey involving substantial practical experimentation.
Do you really believe that DLR is from a heat source which can transfer energy up a temperature gradient? It's bunkum and no other scientific discipline thinks it's correct. Yet if climate science were to conform to this accepted scientific norm, it would be to admit there is no theoretical basis for the high feedback which has to be offset by equally imaginary high cooling by clouds.
You are welcome to stay in the wilderness of a discredited pseudo-science supported by huddled activists wondering who deceived them and why, or you could break free to become a proper scientist and have no need to insult others with unwarranted accusations apparently to make yourself feel better.
snotrocket: You're too kind, but there is no copyright or IPR, so Oscar it's yours as well as mine.
mdgnn: I'm on the fence in your discussions, mainly through an utter and complete lack of understanding of the detail ( a position I've found myself in many times before), but I believe you do have a point, energy cannot travel from cold to warmth, unless there's another theory of thermodynamics. Maybe we can persuade someone from the scientific community to come and argue the case with you.
MDGNN
I have and I don't. Perhaps you would like to provide some examples?
Geronimo
Well, I can't invoke Spencer himself to come and set MDGNN straight, but here is what he says on his blog (emphasis as original):
Read the rest here...
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2010/07/yes-virginia-cooler-objects-can-make-warmer-objects-even-warmer-still/
BBD
Roy Spencer is talking nonsense. A cooler object cannot make a warmer object get even warmer; in the absence of a source of energy, all the cooler object can do is slow down the rate of cooling of the warmer object. If there is a source of energy, the warmer object may get hotter because it is receiving more energy than it is losing; and it is losing energy to the cooler object at a lower rate than it would in the absence of the cooler object, because the cooler object is blocking radiation from the warmer object going out to, say, space. It is the extra energy from the source that warms the warmer object, not energy from the cooler object.
Philip Bratby
Well, get over to his blog and bend his ear about it then. And let us know how you get on.
Good article Richard, worthy of the future head of the MO, no doubt.
"A cooler object cannot make a warmer object get even warmer; in the absence of a source of energy..."
Spencer says later in the same article:
"It will end up even hotter than it was before the cooler plate was placed next to it. This is because the second plate reduced the rate at which the first plate was losing energy."
"because the cooler object is blocking radiation from the warmer object going out to, say, space"
It's the word "blocking" that needs to be expanded here. Object A emits radiation towards space but object B gets in the way and absorbs the radiation, but how does that affect object A? Does A radiate less and B only upwards towards space, or does A radiate the same as it did before and B radiate a little of it back to cancel out part of the effect? Is that what "blocking" means?
You can take an extreme example and consider two surfaces at the same temperature facing one another. If surface A radiates the same amount to surface B as B radiates back to A, the net effect is as if neither was radiating. There is no net energy flow; the radiation energies going in each direction cancel. But does that mean that each surface really does stop radiating? How does each surface know the other is there, to know whether to radiate or not? If the other surface was a light-year away, would it still know?
The usual physics says that surfaces radiate a fixed amount based on their own temperature, irrespective of the temperature of their surroundings. Because hotter objects radiate more, the net flow is always from hotter to colder. But that's only the *net* flow, radiation from a cool object can hit a warmer object and be absorbed, and when a cool object "blocks" the escape of radiation from a hot object to space, it is the back-flow that slows the cooling of the hot object.
The usual physics also says that if I take a hot surface and cover it with a hot object at the *same* temperature, the original surface still radiates the same amount as it did before, but the hot object on top radiates the same amount back, and the net flow between them is zero. We can ignore the radiation flowing between them, and usually do, but it's still there. This still applies even as the separation between them approaches zero, so we have the amazing realisation that even inside an opaque body there is still radiation flying around between all the atoms, but because source and destination are at essentially the same temperature, it all cancels out. An atom or molecule in the middle of a body behaves the same, according to the same phyical laws, still has the same energy levels and charged electrons flying around, and so still radiates and absorbs.
This internal radiation is also a form of "back-radiation", but in this case is equal in magnitude to the "forward-radiation". It's real and it's experimentally measurable, but it raises some questions over "back-radiation" as an explanation of the greenhouse effect because we can use it as a test of the physics. Because the back-radiation inside an opaque body is much more powerful than that in the atmosphere, we can use it as an extreme version of the greenhouse effect to examine the physics - without requiring a 10 km column of air. Opacity is the characteristic property of a 'greenhouse' gas - the more opaque the substance, the more powerful a greenhouse agent it is. That's what being a greenhouse gas means. So we can produce super-condensed examples of greenhouse substances and study the radiation physics of them conveniently in the lab.
Having observed the evolution of the attitudes of those promoting 'official' climate science toward those who dissented, I would say the watershed moment was Climategate 1 in late 2009. Prior to this, sceptical views, where they did escape the blanket of media censorship into wide public view, were inevitably greeted with a crescendo of scorn and condemnation. The furore over the Great Global Warming Swindle in 2007 was typical. Climategate was a seismic moment placing the establishment on the back foot for the first time. Paul Dennis was first out of the blocks with his blog 'Harmonicoscillator' in Feb 2010, and in its lauch he very deliberately set out to engage sceptics and likewarmers by posting links on Bishop Hill as well as Lucia's, and Anthony Watts himself also made several welcoming comments. Unfortunately Paul's blog regrettably went into hibernation almost as soon as it started, but is still there, eg the Ravetz thread below, and we can always hope that it will re-awake.
http://harmonicoscillator.wordpress.com/2010/02/10/jerome-ravetz-and-post-normal-science/
That same month Judith Curry created another aftershock with her defence of the HSI, and then embarked on her head-to-head heavyweight contest on Collide-a-Scape with Gavin Schmidt. Judith was on a determined crusade to clean up climate science and engage with sceptics. She soon started her own blog Climate Etc with this mission from the outset, and continues so to do. Her posts and the comment debates set a high bar for all that follow.
I hope Richard Betts considers setting up his own blog in due course, but always enjoy his appearances here and his courteous respectful and civil manner. I hope he understands some of the pent up frustrations which are vented from time to time as is the nature of the blog medium, and that these are not meant personally or vindictively.
NiV
No, they coexist.
" There is no net energy flow; the radiation energies going in each direction cancel."
"No, they coexist."
Same thing.
It's a matter of terminology.
There is energy flowing from body i to body j. Likewise, there is an equal flow from body j to body i. They coexist - both are real, with real photons moving in the two directions.
Energy is inherently a non-negative quantity and so radiation does not cancel radiation. (Let's not discuss interference patterns - we're talking about macroscopic effects here.) Nonetheless, the energy being gained at a body is zero because the flow arriving cancels the flow departing, in terms of total energy remaining in the body.
Thanks everyone for your comments, glad you found it an interesting post.
Gixxerboy: yes, Speckled Hen would go down a treat, thanks very much! Down here in Devon I've discovered O'Hanlon's, I can recommend their Yellow Hammer....
BTW your image of a Bishop Hill night out ending with a fight in the car park was hilarious. Of course, I will be taking bet(t)s on the likely winner!
Geronimo: not sure whether you read the whole of my Nature blog post or just BH's excerpt. If you read my whole post you'll see that I want to talk about the science and not just boring old emissions policies :-)
The exact nature of Prevost Exchange Energy is more complex than most imagine. It's because it's the direct communication between the IR density of states in the two emitters/absorbers.
You deduce this by imposing an imaginary temperature perturbation on one of the emitters. Suppose it's downwards. That means less radiation is emitted by it so less is received by the other object. Its IR density of states is depleted so the rate of transfer of vibrational [thermal] energy to the IR excited state increases thus increasing radiative flux to the first body.
So, Prevost Exchange is a real time communication mechanism. Remember the 1st and 2nd laws of thermodynamics are the most basic laws of science.and for climate science to claim to breach the 2nd Law is scientific vandalism of the most extreme kind: 'back radiation' can do no thermodynamic work.
Jan 18, 2012 at 4:31 PM | Stephen Richards
Yes, I know, and in fact it has always been done in climate science too, it's just that those outside the field don't tend to see it because the "scientific interest" talk often gets drowned in all the policy talk.
So called back radiation is a by product of John Tyndall's faulty experimental design, where he confounded pressure with radiation.
When CO2 is heated in a sealed vessel, it expands more that natural air does as a result of the same amount of heating.
Hence the pressure in the CO2 vessel is higher than in the control containing just air.
Higher pressure in the CO2 vessel raises temperature more than air in the control.
Release the pressure in the two vessels and both CO2 and the air rise to the same temperature as a response to being heated.
Now please everyone, do go and read Nikolov & Zeller.
Hopefully you will all come to realise that so called green house gasses do not raise temperature.
If you want to call me a denier then that's your privilidge.
I do deny that wrongly applied physical theories like greenhouse can ever explain reality.
Looks as though AGW as a theory is on it's way out.
The various discussions of atmospheric CO2 "heating/slowing cooling" of Earth's surface temperature could benefit from some commonsense. Here are three commonsense points:
1. The claim that "cooler objects can cause warmer objects to become warmer" is false. Would people please stop making it? Even if the claim is modified to mean that warmer objects cool slower it remains false. For example, if you immerse me in a large ice bath then I will not become warmer or cool slower.
2. The claim that "cooler objects can cause warmer objects to become warmer" is perhaps true if limited to radiation theory only. If we are talking only about the radiation that reaches Earth from the Sun and the radiation that Earth emits from its surface and the effects of CO2 on this radiation exchange then we might very well conclude that CO2 slows Earth's emissions of radiation and, thereby, causes Earth's surface to "warm/cool slower."
3. There is more between Heaven and Earth than radiation and CO2. Even poor old Arrhenius was aware of this point and understood that the effects of CO2 on Earth's surface temperature are not determined by radiation exchanges alone. Radiation theory must be supplemented by additional physical hypotheses which cover clouds, moisture, and other matters. At this time, there are no well confirmed physical hypotheses which cover these matters. So we cannot make reasonable claims to the effect that science shows that temperatures will change by some specifiable amount. Because climate science remains remiss in this area and does no actual empirical research, we will have no determinate number for the foreseeable future.