[Coral-List] Expert Disagreement in Climate, Science

Douglas Fenner douglasfennertassi at gmail.com
Thu Feb 2 15:35:27 EST 2017


     I was thinking yesterday that I forgot to mention Venus.  Atmosphere
of 96.5% CO2, 3.5% nitrogen, and clouds made of sulfuric acid, pressure at
surface 92 times that on earth (= that at 3000 feet deep in water on
earth!), temperature at surface of 462 C or 863 F.  Just reading from
Wikipedia at the moment.  "It may have had water oceans in the past,[15]
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus#cite_note-16>[16]
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus#cite_note-17> but these would have
vaporized as the temperature rose due to a runaway greenhouse effect
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runaway_greenhouse_effect>.[17]
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus#cite_note-Jakosky-18>"   "The CO2-rich
atmosphere generates the strongest greenhouse effect
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_effect> in the Solar System,
creating surface temperatures of at least 735 K (462 °C).[13]
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus#cite_note-nasa_venus-14>[56]
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus#cite_note-58> This makes Venus's
surface hotter than Mercury <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercury_(planet)>'s,
which has a minimum surface temperature of 55 K (−220 °C) and maximum
surface temperature of 695 K (420 °C)."  Although Mercury is much closer to
the sun, Venus is hotter, so the reason Venus is so hot is not solely
because it is closer to the sun than earth.  So if anybody says that there
is a limit to how high a temperature can be pushed by CO2, Venus shows the
limit.  Unfortunately, Venus sounds rather inhospitable to life as we know
it.  Mind you, it takes a super dense atmosphere of nearly pure CO2 to get
that hot.  Venus illustrates that if instead of a tiny amount of CO2, you
have a LOT of CO2 you also get a huge effect.  It shows that CO2 does
indeed absorb enough infrared to heat atmospheres, and can heat them to
catastrophic temperatures.  There might be a lesson in there somewhere.
     Also forgot to mention that viruses are much smaller than bacteria,
yet can also have effects way out of proportion to their size (need an
electron microscope to see one).  Anybody know how many virus particles of
Ebola are needed to catch it?  Personally, I'm not going to try even one
particle, and I highly recommend against it.
     Cheers,  Doug

On Mon, Jan 30, 2017 at 12:53 PM, Douglas Fenner <
douglasfennertassi at gmail.com> wrote:

> Gene,
>
> Abstract:  a critical examination the argument and evidence in the video
> you pointed us to leads to the conclusion that it is misleading denier
> propaganda.
>
>
> This is long, read only if you want to.  You’ve been warned.
>
>
>     The UTube video you pointed to in your posting is, ah, "interesting."
> I think it is a great example of when a person should use critical thinking
> to examine an argument about climate change or global warming.
>
>      The video starts out saying that CO2 is "less than 0.04% of the
> earth's air".   0.04% = 400 ppm, the type of number usually quoted (we are
> now a tiny bit above 400 ppm).  That is one way to say it, and a common way
> to say it.  Obviously it is a small proportion of the atmosphere, compared
> to Nitrogen (78%) or Oxygen (21%).  But there are other ways to say it
> too.  One would be the weight of CO2 in the atmosphere.  Wikipedia says the
> total weight of carbon in the atmosphere is about 852 gigatons (400 ppm X
> 2.13 gigatons of carbon per 1 ppm; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
> Carbon_dioxide_in_Earth%27s_atmosphere ); the CO2 in the atmosphere would
> weigh about 3124 gigatons (CO2 has a molecular weight of about 44, C has a
> molecular weight of about 12).  If you talk about CO2 being just 0.04% of
> the atmosphere, a trace gas, then it sounds like an extremely small
> amount.  If you talk about 3124 gigatons, maybe that sounds like just a
> tiny bit more.  So you can massage the facts to get people to think the way
> you want them to think.
>
>      Then he says that of 85,800 molecules in the atmosphere, represented
> by a big pile of rice grains, only 33 are CO2.  He says that of the 33
> molecules of CO2, 32 are natural, carbon dioxide from human activity is
> only 3% of earth's annual CO2 production.  85,800 molecules of air, 32
> molecules of CO2 from nature, and 1 molecule from us.  But that's only
> what's in the atmosphere.  30-40% of the CO2 released by humans dissolves
> in water, primarily the oceans.
>
>       Actually, the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere was 280 ppm in 1750
> before the industrial revolution (and for the previous 10,000 years), and
> is 400 ppm now.  So actually, of 33 molecules of CO2, 11 are from humans.
> The video uses slight of hand to change from talking about the amount of
> CO2 in the atmosphere to the amount humans release per year, to make it
> look like the total amount humans have put in the atmosphere is much less
> than it actually is.
>
>        This video is presenting argument No. 75, "CO2 is just a trace gas"
> in the list of 193 arguments that climate change deniers use in their
> standard stock of rotating arguments.  All are listed and debunked on the
> Skeptical Science website, https://skepticalscience.com/argument.php  The
> "trace gas" argument is debunked on https://skepticalscience.com/
> CO2-trace-gas.htm  I believe I earlier argued here that small amounts,
> indeed traces, of some things can have large effects.  Traces of nerve gas
> can kill people, as can traces of polonium, plutonium, mercury, lead, etc..
> How many cells of anthrax are required to kill a person?  How big is one
> bacterial cell?  (Ever tried to see a single bacterium clearly in anything
> but the highest power in a light microscope?  And does it look large at
> high power?)  Traces of some elements are deliberately put into silicon
> wafers to make transistors in the chips that make computers run.  And on
> and on, the website gives a number of other examples.  Actually, far
> smaller traces of CH4 (methane, 0.00018% of the atmosphere) are present in
> the atmosphere, but it is still important because methane is about 72 times
> as powerful than CO2 at absorbing infrared radiation in sunlight (over a 20
> year period).  The size of the effect depends not only on the
> concentration, but on how powerful each molecule is (conveniently omitted
> in the video).
>
>       But the intuition is strong that something that is present in very
> small quantities shouldn’t be able to cause huge effects.  Actually,
> another common practice facilitates this miss-perception when it comes to
> climate.  The practice is the use of the common temperature scales,
> Fahrenheit and Celsius (Centigrade).  These are arbitrary temperature
> scales that don’t correspond with the actual scale of temperature which
> physical processes correspond to.  The problem is that the zero point was
> chosen completely arbitrarily as a cold day for F, and the melting point of
> ice for C.  Yes, the melting point of ice does correspond to one physical
> change point.  But it is hardly zero temperature, it is easy to find or
> produce temperatures vastly lower than 0 C or 0 F.  There is a true zero,
> that is 0 Kelvin, absolute zero.  Actual physical processes correspond to
> the Kelvin scale.  So, for instance, the gas laws (that we use in SCUBA
> courses) depend on using the Kelvin temperatures, not F or C (0 C = 273
> Kelvin, so it is a big difference).  Many people think that the earth
> warming just 2 C is pretty small.  If it is a small effect, then having a
> small amount of CO2 in the atmosphere makes that difference in temperature
> seems a bit more intuitive.  A 2 C rise from 15 C to 17 C average world
> temp looks like a fairly large proportional change, that’s a 13% rise in
> temperature.  But that’s misleading.  In the absolute or Kelvin temperature
> scale, which is the real scale, it is the rise from 288 K to 290 K, a
> change of 0.7%.  Suddenly, the effect is seen to be a very small effect,
> which intuitively fits with the very small proportion of the atmosphere
> that is CO2.  The “rice video’s” argument falls apart.  Life as we know it
> exists only in a very narrow band of temperatures, that appears to be
> incredibly narrow when you compare with the temperature in the center of
> the sun, about 15.7 million degrees K (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun)..
>
>       What counts is neither what percentage of the atmosphere is CO2, nor
> what the total weight of CO2 is in the atmosphere, what counts is how much
> infrared radiation CO2 in the atmosphere absorbs.  Actually, if there were
> no CO2 at all in the atmosphere, the average temperature of earth's surface
> would be -18 C (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide_in_Earth%
> 27s_atmosphere), which would make much or all water on earth ice.  We
> actually need some CO2 in the atmosphere to make earth habitable.  Another
> aspect is that CO2 does not absorb temperature, it absorbs infrared
> energy.  Although temperature is influenced by energy, it is not a simple
> relationship.  Some substances have more heat capacity than others.  Water
> has a relatively high heat capacity (https://en.wikipedia.org/
> wiki/Heat_capacity).  Plus, water as a fluid can move around, carrying
> heat with it.  So ocean water can carry heat away from the surface down
> into the ocean or bring it up.  Water covers a majority of the earth's
> surface  Thus, although the increased CO2 in our atmosphere captures more
> heat energy, that does not dictate that at all times and all places,
> temperatures will always rise without exception.  Land temperatures could
> fail to rise even though CO2 continues to capture more heat energy than is
> lost, because the oceans can carry heat energy down into the ocean away
> from the surface.  What it does mean is that that the total heat energy in
> the earth's air, water and land surface will continue to rise, and thus the
> temperature somewhere in the system will rise but not necessarily at the
> surface of the land and water.
>
>       Then the video says that that CO2 only lasts 4 years in the
> atmosphere, “not 100 or even 1000 as you’re being told.”  Not true (the
> video provides no source or evidence to back up their statement).  “The
> atmospheric lifetime of CO2 is estimated of the order of 30–95 years.” (
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_gas), “Although more than half
> of the CO2 emitted is removed from the atmosphere within a century, some
> fraction (about 20%) of emitted CO2 remains in the atmosphere for many
> thousands of years.”
>
>     It then says that temperature changes precede changes in carbon
> dioxide levels.  That’s denier argument No. 12, debunked on Skeptical
> Science (https://skepticalscience.com/co2-lags-temperature.htm).
>
>
>      I submit that this is a sophisticated piece of propaganda, easily
> able to mislead people who don't take the time to parse every statement
> carefully, look everything up, and examine the logic very carefully.  Or
> who simply want to believe what it says no matter what the actual evidence
> is.
>
>      I prefer the term "critical thinking" to "skepticism", and I think
> "critical thinking" has to be combined with looking up the actual facts,
> not inventing "alternative facts" to make the story come out the way you
> want.
>
>     The list of arguments on the Skeptical Science website is interesting,
> I recognized several that have been used on this list at different times,
> such as "climate's changed before", "it's the sun", "It's cooling", "it
> hasn't warmed since 1998", "we're heading into an ice age", "ocean
> acidification isn't serious" "its freaking cold", etc.
>
>
>
>      For more about the group, "Galileo Movement", that put this video
> out, see
>
>
>
> http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Galileo_Movement
>
>
>
> https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/galileo-movement-
> fuels-australia-climate-change-divide/
>
>
>
> And the author of the video, Malcom Roberts
>
>
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malcolm_Roberts_(politician)
>
>
>
> Cheers,  Doug
>
> On Tue, Jan 10, 2017 at 12:37 PM, Douglas Fenner <
> douglasfennertassi at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Gene,
>>     I agree with those that have replied to you and thank them for
>> clarifications.  There are a few other things that I'll try to clarify a
>> little.
>>     I have a lot of sympathy for much of what you say, and agree that the
>> terminology of global warming and climate change may seem confusing to
>> those that haven't spent much time reading up on them.  The things that are
>> going on around the globe that involve climate, temperature, CO2, ocean pH
>> and several other related things are complicated.  Much of science is
>> complicated.  I dare say much of geology is complicated.  Yet in spite of
>> the complexities of geology, when the evidence supporting plate tectonics
>> (originally called "continental drift") became strong enough, geologists
>> accepted it and writers of popular science explained it to the public, and
>> the public did not reject it.  Today it is not controversial.  The big
>> difference with global warming and climate change is that the evidence of
>> plate tectonics did not point to humans as the cause, did not predict that
>> if humans didn't stop causing it that there would be huge damage to the
>> environment and human civilization, and that major changes to human society
>> would be required which would cost some large industries and human society
>> a lot of money to change.  But climate change and global warming did, and
>> people differed on what they thought should be done about it, and the
>> industry that would be affected (fossil fuels) funded people to sow doubt
>> in the public's mind about the science, some of the people being people who
>> did a similar job for the tobacco industry.  Records show clearly that the
>> tobacco industry knew full well that tobacco caused cancer and nicotine was
>> addictive, but lied deliberately to protect its profits, and eventually
>> lost in court big time.  The records now also show that Exxon has long
>> known from its own scientists that CO2 emissions from fossil fuels have
>> caused global warming.  But someone who is smart enough to publish lots of
>> papers in the science of geology could probably learn enough about climate
>> science to understand the differences between climate change and global
>> warming.
>>     But complexity is part of science.  So is specialization.  Only those
>> who work in a particular specialization can begin to know all the ins and
>> outs of all the complexities of the methods and data that provide the
>> evidence that either fits with theories or doesn't (and therefore disproves
>> them).  Even people who work on the same general discipline can have a hard
>> time judging the evidence in a different specialty, it's even harder for
>> the general public to understand and judge.  But when the vast majority of
>> scientists working in a specialty come to one conclusion about a general
>> aspect of science like plate tectonics, other scientists realize that's the
>> best current available science, and accept it as they do similar things in
>> their own specialty.  Except when industries and political organizations
>> decide it is to their advantage to weigh in and fund those who have
>> expertise in persuading the public, including the use of propaganda and
>> disinformation.  The complexity of science, limited amount of scientific
>> training in the general public, etc. makes it easier for propaganda efforts
>> to persuade the public of things which the scientific evidence doesn't
>> support.
>>        The term "climate change" was introduced largely because there is
>> a complex of things going on, which include global warming, but also
>> including several other things that are not global warming, and they have
>> common or overlapping causes.  First, global warming is an average, and at
>> any one point in time, the weather can be colder than it was a short time
>> ago (so there is variation like there is in all of nature).  Second, global
>> warming is producing a variety of things other than warming, such as local
>> droughts, increased rainfall some places, ice melting, sea level rising,
>> increased intensity of cyclones (= hurricanes and typhoons) and so on.
>> Those are not themselves warming, but are in part produced by warming.  So
>> an umbrella term was needed, and the one that caught on is "climate
>> change."  That wasn't a complete solution of the problem, since CO2 which
>> is implicated in global warming and the things it causes is also the cause
>> of the reduction of pH in the ocean, which has been dubbed "acidification"
>> (though it as I think you pointed out correctly it only involves the
>> reduction of the basic pH of seawater and is not projected to go below pH
>> 7, and so some consider it misleading.  I would argue the term refers to
>> the direction of change not the absolute pH, but in any case it might not
>> be the best possible term.)  It is also clearly not global warming.  You or
>> anyone else can invent any term you like and use it all you want, there is
>> no language police.  If your fellow scientists find it useful and/or the
>> public or media find it catchy, it may catch on and become widely used.
>> You're free to promote it all you wish.  If you or someone else comes up
>> with a better term I'll applaud you.  In general, I suspect that anything
>> that requires a paragraph to explain, or even a sentence, is unlikely to
>> catch on.  So, at the moment, "acidification", "global warming" and
>> "climate change" are all in use.
>>       I simply point out that claiming that there is great uncertainty \
>> is one of the tactics of those who are funded by the fossil fuel industry
>> use, to try to sow doubt in the public's mind.  Maybe "it is all too
>> confusing" is their newest claim.  Something they do certainly must be
>> working, at least in the US, where a large segment of the populations
>> thinks that "global warming" and "climate change" are hoaxes, or believe
>> that it is natural, or that scientists don't agree on them, or there is
>> lots of doubt in scientists minds, etc.  And of course a US president has
>> just been elected that has publicly stated that climate change is a Chinese
>> hoax.  In fact, among publishing climate scientists (neither I nor you,
>> Gene, are publishing climate scientists), an overwhelmingly majority accept
>> the evidence that global warming and climate change are real and that
>> humans are the primary (but not only) cause of the current warming (but
>> clearly not of warming and/or cooling in the geological record, since
>> humans weren't even present during most of the geological record).  Anyone
>> who wishes to can change their views at any time, and my memory was that in
>> the past on coral-list you pointed out that there were cold periods as
>> though that showed that there was no global warming and the "hiatus" showed
>> there was no global warming, but now you seem to be saying that you accept
>> evidence that global warming is real.  We all have a right to change our
>> views as more evidence comes in, many or most scientists do that from time
>> to time.  Though one of the goals of those who work to discredit climate
>> science is to do everything they can to drag their heels and slow the
>> acceptance of the science, giving the fossil fuel industry more time to
>> make profits.
>>       I agree that scientists would do well to have some degree of
>> skepticism.  Of course, when a theory like Einstein's theories of general
>> relativity and special relativity make predictions that are confirmed by
>> every test that is made, and alternative theories have all failed tests,
>> then it is clear that Einstein's theories are the best available scientific
>> theories and supported by the evidence.  Being super critical of them might
>> help someone develop a new theory, and that's perfectly fine.  But to base
>> public policy on anything that contradicts relativity would be very foolish
>> and not serve the public good.  Same true with other theories that have
>> massive evidence that supports them, such as plate tectonics, evolution,
>> the planets orbiting the sun instead of them all orbiting the earth, earth
>> being nearly perfectly round instead of flat, and global warming/climate
>> change.  The US military certainly includes global warming and climate
>> change in their planning, based on the best available science, because the
>> potential consequences for the country of being wrong are very high indeed.
>>      There is a major difference between a scientist who uses a healthy
>> skepticism when considering science, and someone who applies skepticism
>> vigorously to theories they don't like, but clearly doesn't apply any
>> skepticism to the the theories they do like and promote.  Someone who does
>> that consistently and vigorously is often called a "denier" these days,
>> though anyone can call them anything they want.  When the pattern of bias
>> is consistent, then the person can be seen not to be following the
>> evidence, but some other agenda, often ideological.  That's not science,
>> but saying it is just being skeptical is a way to masquerade as science.
>> It's part of a deceptive practice.  Deception or attempted deception is
>> thought by some to be common in politics.
>>      You ask whether we know if computer models accurately replicate
>> nature.  My understanding is that there are ways of getting at this with
>> climate models.  Not only can the results of the model be compared to the
>> climate change that the earth has undergone so far, and climate change that
>> occurs after the model was constructed, but they can be checked to see if
>> they predict some of the shorter-term changes that are ubiquitous and
>> strong around the earth, such as day-night changes, seasonal changes, and
>> differences with latitude.  As long as you check things that were not used
>> in tuning the model in the first place, they are are real tests of
>> predictions of the models and thus tests of the models.
>>      Cheers,  Doug
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Jan 4, 2017 at 3:51 PM, Dennis Hubbard <
>> dennis.hubbard at oberlin.edu> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi all:
>>>
>>> Gene makes some valid observations about what we know vs what we infer,
>>> and
>>> the general confusion that arises from terminology. While I am not an
>>> expert on much of this, I would like to offer some perspective on two of
>>> Gene's points (a lack of knowledge has never stood in my way - and I'm
>>> happy to observe that I'm in good company).
>>>
>>> Regarding "global warming" vs "climate change", part of the intent was
>>> to,
>>> in fact, show that "up" was not an inviolate thermal trend. We know that
>>> patterns in the tropics can be decidedly different by region or latitude.
>>> But, more important, the problem is not just a warming planet, but a
>>> world
>>> in which climate is increasingly variable. Things like ENSO contribute to
>>> the variability in an overall warming trend. Synoptic satellite
>>> measurements are now showing that sea-level rise is not evenly
>>> distributed
>>> (even if we take away local tectonic motion). Sea level is rising in much
>>> of the western Indo-Pacific region and on the GBR at over 10 mm/yr,
>>> compared to less than 2 mm/yr along much of the eastern US coast. This
>>> has
>>> been explained as a response to larger-scale atmospheric forcings (again,
>>> ENSO-like processes).
>>>
>>> Because sea level cannot continuously rise more at point A than at point
>>> B
>>> (lest we build a slope down which one can water ski), these patterns must
>>> change over time, evening out to the global average (presently at ca. 3..5
>>> mm/yr). This suggests that even things like ENSO, similar cycles in other
>>> oceans and even the "ocean conveyor belt" must change temporally; some
>>> evidence suggests a temporal scale of 30-60 years.
>>>
>>> So, "Climate Change" is probably a more correct descriptor than "Global
>>> Warming". My suggestion is that we try to educate the public better
>>> rather
>>> than opting for lowering scientific rigor to the level of the average
>>> American voter (remembering that we are  the only nation to not adopt the
>>> metric system).
>>>
>>> Regarding models, I agree with Gene's suggestion that we might not fully
>>> know whether they accurately replicate nature. However, we can still
>>> consider several factors that can at least approximate the level of
>>> correspondence. First, the models start with measured data that provide a
>>> reasonable picture of how temperature and sea level have changed since
>>> the
>>> late 1700's. The obvious caveat here is that tide gauges and weather
>>> stations were poorly distributed at the time of the Declaration of
>>> Independence, but error bars can reasonably characterize the nature of
>>> the
>>> reliability of an annual data point. Starting with this record, climate
>>> scientists move on to basic atmospheric and oceanic physics. While the
>>> relative impacts of various controlling factors (including "randomness")
>>> are less-than-perfectly constrained, modelers can manipulate each within
>>> reasonable limits to come up with a "best fit" for the observed changes
>>> in
>>> temperature or sea level. The big assumption here is that the match
>>> suggests that we have reasonably weighted these variables for the known
>>> past and can, therefore, reasonably use them to model forward.
>>>
>>> One might reasonably argue (and I have) that this approach is imperfect..
>>> However, one can still make reasonable calculations of the magnitude of
>>> error that a particular assumption can cause and use this to constrain
>>> the
>>> potential errors within a given modeling scenario. At the same time. one
>>> can also focus on the things that have changed dramatically (e.g., carbon
>>> dioxide concentration in the atmosphere). Because these seem to dominate
>>> the math when we do this exercise, the models appear to not be as bad as
>>> we
>>> might have argued. In contrast, the range of C)2 values used in the
>>> various
>>> modeling scenarios clearly show that future decisions will have a much
>>> larger impact than natural changes over the past couple of centuries.
>>>
>>> I will end this logical foray with two observations. First, even if one
>>> doubles the measured changes in atmospheric CO2 prior to the industrial
>>> revolution, the agreement between the model and the record shifts little.
>>> In contrast, since 1900 the changes have resulted in major upward shifts
>>> in
>>> temperature (and presumably atmospheric instability, aka 'climate
>>> change").
>>> Thus, the models are vindicated, at least at a semi-quantitative level.
>>> Perhaps even more telling, each successive IPCC report provides a range
>>> and
>>> a median scenario for warming. In each report, the new "median" shifts
>>> toward the upper end of the previous range - a pattern that might leave
>>> you
>>> warm, but not "fuzzy" about the climate. As a colleague once argued when
>>> his data were challenged, "You may not feel that my 19 data points going
>>> in
>>> the same direction are statistically valid, but if you walked into a
>>> casino
>>> and rolled craps 19 straight time, would you ask for a new pair of dice?"
>>>
>>> Climate science is far from perfect, but it seems clear that variability
>>> (climate change) is as important, and maybe more so than average change
>>> (global warming). Remember that it's not the average increase of summer
>>> temperature that is killing very old and very young folks in Chicago (or
>>> the corals in the GFBR) - it's the extreme swings.
>>>
>>> Happy New Year to all - and to the non-Americans, you can now relish the
>>> knowledge that North Korea no longer has the craziest leader.
>>>
>>> Dennis
>>>
>>> On Wed, Jan 4, 2017 at 7:47 AM, Eugene Shinn <eugeneshinn at mail.usf.edu>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>> > Do coral-list readers remember back when we all talked and worried
>>> about
>>> > global warming? As I recall that was mainly before the 1998 El Nino.
>>> > Then for about 20 years global temperature flattened somewhat and
>>> > sometime during that time global warming became “climate change.” As a
>>> > result of this change the subject became more confusing especially for
>>> > the public and coral biologists. Geologist, however, have always known
>>> > that climate has been changing. Such change is most obvious in
>>> > Pleistocene ice core records that clearly show periodic glacial and
>>> > interglacial (warming and cooling) periods as well as concomitant CO_2
>>> > ups and downs. Beside ice core data recent melting of glaciers of
>>> course
>>> > is undeniable evidence of warming. So why is it called “climate change”
>>> > instead of climate warming? And of course we have all seen the decline
>>> > in coral reefs. My 56-year photographic record in the Florida Keys
>>> > dramatically show coral demise began in the late 1970s and culminated
>>> in
>>> > the early 1980s. Unfortunately the reefs have experienced a downhill
>>> > slide ever since.
>>> >
>>> > We have all worried about how to get our message to the public and
>>> > decision makers. We have not done a good job of it. I suspect the term
>>> > Climate Change has made communicating with the public more difficult.
>>> > The problem is we have used the term Climate Change almost
>>> > interchangeably with CO_2 /Methane and greenhouse gases. As a result
>>> the
>>> > whole complex subject has become emotional economic and political.
>>> > Emotions are so strong that if one questions whether CO_2 is the cause
>>> > he or she is labeled a “Climate Change Denier.” Why not CO_2 or Carbon
>>> > denier? These arguments must be very confusing to nonscientists. So
>>> when
>>> > a politician calls Climate Change a hoax does he or she really mean
>>> > temperature has not risen or fallen in the past 100 years or do they
>>> > mean that they do not believe CO_2 and other greenhouse gases are the
>>> > cause? These become difficult questions when we don’t clarify what we
>>> > mean. Regardless what skeptics may believe they are nevertheless
>>> branded
>>> > climate deniers and compared to those who believe the Earth is flat.
>>> > Good scientists have always been skeptics regardless of the subject.
>>> >
>>> > The recent election has multiplied our concerns and postings on the
>>> list
>>> > continue to confuse global warming with climate change. The term
>>> Climate
>>> > change logically means temperature can go down as well as up. So why
>>> > can’t we just say what we mean? To make the subject even more confusing
>>> > many have begun to say carbon is the major cause of warming when they
>>> > should be saying Carbon dioxide. As scientists we like to see evidence
>>> > based on a controlled experiments. Those are experiments where we treat
>>> > X number of organisms with varying amounts of a substance B, and
>>> compare
>>> > results with X number of subjects not treated with substance B. I
>>> > realize that’s old-fashioned scientific proof but it is straightforward
>>> > and even the most ardent skeptics can understand the results.
>>> >
>>> > Unfortunately we cannot perform these kinds of straight experiments. We
>>> > lack reference planets the same distance from the sun as earth to serve
>>> > as a reference. What we have done is show experimentally in the
>>> > laboratory (as did Svante Arrhenius back in 1896) that raising CO_2
>>> > levels increases adsorption of infrared radiation and thus raises
>>> > temperature. We then infer (note I said infer) that CO_2 also raises
>>> > atmospheric temperature as it does in laboratory experiments.
>>> >
>>> > We know the computer climate model outputs are mathematically correct
>>> > but do we really know they accurately replicate nature? A little bias
>>> > one way or the other can influence the outcome. One should also be
>>> > suspicious because many models (there are more than 20) is that while
>>> > CO_2 has continued to rise since 1998 global temperature did not rise
>>> at
>>> > the rate predicted by most models. The public and many politicians are
>>> > often reminded of these problems so it is no wonder that many are
>>> > confused and remain skeptical. I am confused as anyone. The message in
>>> > the  Australian youtube does not clarify the problem for most of
>>> > us..<https://www.youtube.com/embed/BC1l4geSTP8> I suggest we drop the
>>> > term climate change and say what we mean-----global warming.Gene
>>> >
>>> > --
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > No Rocks, No Water, No Ecosystem (EAS)
>>> > ------------------------------------ ------------------------------
>>> -----
>>> > E. A. Shinn, Courtesy Professor
>>> > University of South Florida
>>> > College of Marine Science Room 221A
>>> > 140 Seventh Avenue South
>>> > St. Petersburg, FL 33701
>>> > <eugeneshinn at mail.usf.edu>
>>> > Tel 727 553-1158
>>> > ---------------------------------- -----------------------------------
>>> >
>>> > _______________________________________________
>>> > Coral-List mailing list
>>> > Coral-List at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
>>> > http://coral.aoml.noaa.gov/mailman/listinfo/coral-list
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Dennis Hubbard
>>> Chair, Dept of Geology-Oberlin College Oberlin OH 44074
>>> (440) 775-8346
>>>
>>> * "When you get on the wrong train.... every stop is the wrong stop"*
>>>  Benjamin Stein: "*Ludes, A Ballad of the Drug and the Dream*"
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Coral-List mailing list
>>> Coral-List at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
>>> http://coral.aoml.noaa.gov/mailman/listinfo/coral-list
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Douglas Fenner
>> Contractor for NOAA NMFS, and consultant
>> "have regulator, will travel"
>> PO Box 7390
>> Pago Pago, American Samoa 96799  USA
>>
>> phone 1 684 622-7084 <(684)%20622-7084>
>>
>> Join the International Society for Reef Studies.  Membership includes a
>> subscription to the journal Coral Reefs, and there are discounts for pdf
>> subscriptions and developing countries.  Coral Reefs is the only journal
>> that is ALL coral reef articles, and it has amazingly LOW prices compared
>> to other journals.  Check it out!  www.fit.edu/isrs/
>>
>> "Belief in climate change is optional, participation is not."- Jim
>> Beever.   "Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not to their own
>> facts."- Daniel Patrick Moynihan.
>>
>> 99 Reasons 2016 was a good year.  https://medium.com/future-cru
>> nch/99-reasons-why-2016-has-been-a-great-year-for-humanity-
>> 8420debc2823#.9iznf7pfk  Check items 42-59.
>>
>> 43. Global carbon emissions from the burning of fossil fuels did not grow
>> at all in 2016, for the third year in a row.  Scientific American
>> <http://futurecrunch.us8.list-manage.com/track/click?u=6321feeb3ffd42b0e44a01616&id=18ef49d1e6&e=20926c12c5>
>> (though emissions didn't increase, the total amount in the atmosphere
>> continued to increase)
>>
>> 44. Renewables now account for more newly installed capacity than any
>> other form of electricity in the world, including coal. Gizmodo
>> <http://gizmodo.com/renewables-now-exceed-all-other-forms-of-new-power-gene-1788195297>
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> Douglas Fenner
> Contractor for NOAA NMFS, and consultant
> "have regulator, will travel"
> PO Box 7390
> Pago Pago, American Samoa 96799  USA
>
> phone 1 684 622-7084 <(684)%20622-7084>
>
> Join the International Society for Reef Studies.  Membership includes a
> subscription to the journal Coral Reefs, and there are discounts for pdf
> subscriptions and developing countries.  Coral Reefs is the only journal
> that is ALL coral reef articles, and it has amazingly LOW prices compared
> to other journals.  Check it out!  www.fit.edu/isrs/
>
> "Belief in climate change is optional, participation is not."- Jim Beever..
>   "Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not to their own facts."-
> Daniel Patrick Moynihan.
>
> Last year was- again- the hottest year on record.
> http://www.sciencemag.org/news/sifter/last-year-was-again-hottest-record
>
> 99 Reasons 2016 was a good year.  https://medium.com/future-
> crunch/99-reasons-why-2016-has-been-a-great-year-for-
> humanity-8420debc2823#.9iznf7pfk  Check items 42-59.
>
> 43. Global carbon emissions from the burning of fossil fuels did not grow
> at all in 2016, for the third year in a row.  Scientific American
> <http://futurecrunch.us8.list-manage.com/track/click?u=6321feeb3ffd42b0e44a01616&id=18ef49d1e6&e=20926c12c5>
>
> 44. renewables now account for more newly installed capacity than any
> other form of electricity in the world, including coal.. Gizmodo
> <http://gizmodo.com/renewables-now-exceed-all-other-forms-of-new-power-gene-1788195297>
>
>


-- 
Douglas Fenner
Contractor for NOAA NMFS, and consultant
"have regulator, will travel"
PO Box 7390
Pago Pago, American Samoa 96799  USA

phone 1 684 622-7084

Join the International Society for Reef Studies.  Membership includes a
subscription to the journal Coral Reefs, and there are discounts for pdf
subscriptions and developing countries.  Coral Reefs is the only journal
that is ALL coral reef articles, and it has amazingly LOW prices compared
to other journals.  Check it out!  www.fit.edu/isrs/

"Belief in climate change is optional, participation is not."- Jim Beever.
  "Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not to their own facts."-
Daniel Patrick Moynihan.

Last year was- again- the hottest year on record.
http://www.sciencemag.org/news/sifter/last-year-was-again-hottest-record

99 Reasons 2016 was a good year.
https://medium.com/future-crunch/99-reasons-why-2016-has-been-a-great-year-for-humanity-8420debc2823#.9iznf7pfk
 Check items 42-59.

43. Global carbon emissions from the burning of fossil fuels did not grow
at all in 2016, for the third year in a row.  Scientific American
<http://futurecrunch.us8.list-manage.com/track/click?u=6321feeb3ffd42b0e44a01616&id=18ef49d1e6&e=20926c12c5>

44. renewables now account for more newly installed capacity than any other
form of electricity in the world, including coal.. Gizmodo
<http://gizmodo.com/renewables-now-exceed-all-other-forms-of-new-power-gene-1788195297>


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