Jesus wept, RT, you can find such evidence in any basic text, such as “Global Warming for Dummies”, or you can visit the NASA, NOAA, IPCC or Royal Society web pages, or this one [link to Sceptical Science - wahoo].

If you’re asserting a man-made cause of global warming, it’s up to you to justify it, not up to us to argue somehow against an unexpressed argument. Do you see what I mean?

But actually, I’ve read the relevant IPCC sections and their evidence of anthropogenic attribution is weak to derisory. I’ve also examined the Sceptical Science posting and it’s unpersuasive. They say:

Direct observations find that CO2 is rising sharply due to human activity.

That’s probably right.

Satellite and surface measurements find less energy is escaping to space at CO2 absorption wavelengths.

No, that’s problematic. Data is too sparse and the conclusion is strongly disputed.

Ocean and surface temperature measurements find the planet continues to accumulate heat.

No, quite wrong. Oceanic surface heat content rose somewhat for about 16 years to 2004, but for 8 years has been static. Nobody knows the heat content trend of the entire ocean and alarmists who claim it’s rising are just arm-waving. Global surface temperatures display no trend since about 1997 — for 15 years global temperatures have not risen. Please justify your statement.

So, overall, the IPCC view doesn’t prove either increasing temperatures or increased heat content. It shows a correlation between increasing CO2 levels and increasing global surface temperature towards the end of the last century, but a correlation does not, never did, and never will prove causation.

As a curious piece of confirmation for this, there’s an interesting graph from Jo Nova showing quite good correlation between global warming and US postal prices over the last hundred and thirty years. But nobody seriously thinks they’re actually related.

You don’t think I’ll even try to investigate your claims, since you deny there’s evidence for our assertions. You say:

But you won’t, of course, because you already “know” that it’s all just a hoax that only you, and your fellow geniuses can see through.

This psychological phenomenon is known as “denial”, but it is really no different from a child with their fingers in their ears, shouting “La la la la, I can’t hear you!”.

Yet, where is your evidence?

Hoax? No, there’s been no warming, and that’s enough to argue your claims. To present this as your argument in an adult forum is more peurile than I can describe. Your incompetence is breathtaking. Play elsewhere, sir.

Isaac Held’s 2-box model: another failed ocean-equilibration excuse for dismissing solar warming

by Alec Rawls

[...] Dr. Isaac Held, who models fluid dynamics at NOAA, dismisses a solar explanation for late 20th century warming by invoking a 2-box model of ocean equilibration. In his model an upper upper ocean layer (100m or so deep) exhibits a rapid temperature response to any increase in radiative forcing (about 4 years), as has been observed for this part of the ocean. So far so good.

Below sits Held’s second box: the entire rest of the oceans, all modeled as having the same temperature. To see the effect of this highly unrealistic simplification, look at what would happen if an intermediate ocean layer were also modeled, say from 100 to 500 meters in depth. Following a step-up in forcing the rapid temperature response of the upper ocean layer would commence to warm the intermediate ocean layer on some intermediate time scale—from a few decades to a century perhaps—and the decreasing temperature differential between these two layers would decrease the rate of heat loss from the upper layer to the ocean below, causing the upper ocean layer to continue to warm on the decades-to-century time scale.

This is exactly what Held and others are saying will not happen. Their claim is that the 20th century’s persistent high levels of solar forcing could not have caused continued warming and hence cannot be responsible for late 20th century warming. But these claims always rest on unreliable and often unstated assumptions about ocean equilibration. Held’s assumptions are stated, making his example particularly revealing. His argument against solar warming hinges directly on what is unrealistic about his model.

[...] Do these people actually think that it is the rate of change in the level of a temperature forcing rather than the level of the forcing that does the forcing?

[...] This makes FOUR off-the-cuff attempts to support the claim that persistent forcing can’t cause continued warming, all now dead and buried

1. Mike Lockwood cites Stephen Schwartz’ even more unrealistic one-box model of ocean equilibration.

2. Solanki and Schuessler argue that, since the solar-temperature correlations they have found are strongest with short time lags, rapid temperature responses are all they have evidence for and need to consider. Wrong. Rapid temperature responses of imply longer period responses (just as the solar warming of the day is evidence that the lengthening of the day will warm the season), especially in a system with large heat sinks.

3. Muscheler, Schmidt and others point to the pattern of warming. Since temperatures dipped between 1940 and 1970, the oceans must have equilibrated to the high level of solar forcing that began in the 1920s by at least 1940 they suggest, as if the mid-century wiggle in GMAST means there was a similar wiggle in ocean heat content, despite the apparent domination of GMAST by ocean oscillations.

It is perfectly possible that ocean heat content continued to rise when GMAST dipped and this is what the little heat-content data we have from the mid-20th-century suggests. There was no fall-off in the rate of sea level rise over this period and since surface temperatures were slightly down the melt-rate should not have increased, suggesting that thermal expansion remained steady.

4. Now add Isaac Held’s 2-box fail.

[...] GCMs are multi-thousand box models

If going from 2 to 3 ocean layers changes model behavior so that persistent forcing does cause continued warming on intermediate time scales then a fortiori models with “as many as 30 [ocean] layers” will also exhibit this continued-warming behavior. In full-fledged GCMs convection, ocean currents and even ocean oscillations are all modeled. Heat that gets poured into the oceans for extended periods of time will come back out on similar time scales.

Have GCM tests with enhanced solar effects been run? There are some strong indications that they have not. In particular, if such tests had been run, and if they supported the claim that that continued strong solar forcing would not cause continued warming, then surely these tests would have been cited by the many scientists who make this claim, but no such citations are ever offered.

I’m trying to verify now whether these tests have been run and will do a full post on the subject in the future. In the meantime, if anyone has any information about whether GCM models with enhanced solar forcing have been tested and where any results might be found, please email me (alec-at-rawls-dot-org) or leave a note in the comments.

Conceptually there is no obstacle. Svensmark, for instance, hypothesizes that solar variance might be responsible for a 1% or 2% variation in low cloud cover. Adding this solar response to existing GCMs would be easy. To get the best fit for a given level of cloud effect climate sensitivity would have to be reduced an offsetting amount (which at the same time would reduce the warming effect of CO2). It’s just a matter of actually running the tests.

It the tests have been run, the lack of citations suggests that the results do not support the “consensus” position. There are three scandalous possibilities. 1) That contrary results were found and are being kept secret. 2) That contrary results were found and are available but are going un-cited because they contradict the statements that many scientists are making. 3) That despite over $100b in public funding for climate research the “consensus” never bothered to test the alternate hypothesis (in the “post-normal science” sense of seeing how well the hypothesis performs in model runs).

The only innocent possibility is that the IPCC has simply neglected to cite model-tests that support its otherwise unsupported claims that late 20th century warming cannot have been caused by the sun, but that really isn’t possible, not just because the “consensus” doesn’t behave this way, but because no legitimate GCM would behave this way. Persistent high levels of forcing must tend to create continued surface warming on intermediate time scales, and it must take quite some doing for a scientist to convince himself otherwise.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/11/15/isaac-helds-2-box-model-another-failed-ocean-equilibration-excuse-for-dismissing-solar-warming/#more-74267

The inconvenient Alec Rawls.

Unless by some stroke of good fortune (or political action, change of govt etc) the NZU price is revived. Stamping on any fires that might inflame public opposition to that is an obvious choice for anyone with skin in the game.

>”The only people who showed poor judgement in the Trinity case were those who were prosecuted.”

And Venning J. That is on the record Simpon, no getting around that.

>”This is typical crank behaviour.”

And now the vindictiveness.

>”Attack the reputation of the messenger who conflicts with your world view”

Geoffrey Venning has a message for me that conflicts with my world view? Get a grip Simon.

>”…rather than the underlying facts.”

What were those exactly? Were they the statistical rigour of the NZCSET 7SS? The review of it by professional reviewers but ignored by Venning J? The reticence of NIWA to divulge their methodology? What?

You haven’t got the foggiest clue what you’re talking about have you Brando?

Why don’t lay out the detail of Bob’s “mistaken” “arithmetic” for all the world to see?

But you can’t can you?