Tuesday, July 27, 2010

Follow the Bunny

Already mentioned previously, but Ben Herrman and Roger Pielke Sr. have put their name on the blacklist as a believer in the greenhouse effect, even double posting on Tony Watt's. Roy Spencer is also a believer as is SoD, but we always knew that. Bunnies have read the same arguments again and again here at Rabett Run, especially in our reply to Gerlich and Tscheuschner. Eli DID the damn experiment with a light bulb. And, again and again we have seen how easily denialists can mislead.

The best part of it all is the comment storm, on Pielke and Spencer's posts. Eli especially enjoyed this little colloquium
---------------------------------

Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D. says:
July 24, 2010 at 5:41 AM

Your inappropriate choice of an analogy that presides in a vacuum chamber where only radiation, of the 3 modes of energy transfer, occurs cannot pass without comment. It is either deceitful sleight of hand or a clumsy choice of thought experiment.

But radiation IS the only mode of energy transfer between the Earth and outer space. I use it to make a basic point regarding *radiation*. It is not meant to be a model of all the inner workings of the climate system.

… I am most frustrated at your continued avoidance of my emailed first question to you:
Why are you giving a ‘free pass’ to the unphysical concept of ‘back radiation’ when no serious scientist entertains the notion of ‘back convection’ or ‘back conduction’?

Hmmm…how can I argue against such iron clad logic? :)

As we all know from Lindzen and Choi (2009) ERBE satellite data shows no evidence of any back radiation signal and Earth is not a vacuum chamber.

(1) Lindzen and Choi (2009) did not specifically address back radiation.
(2) I never claimed the Earth is a vacuum chamber…but it is located in one! :) In case you missed this detail, the second bar in the experiment represents the IR-absorbing atmosphere placed between the heated Earth and the vacuum of outer space.

There are now a growing number of eminent international scientists coming out to disagree with you on this incongruity of thinking. Is it not time to apply Occam’s Razor and dump a hypothesis that requires a ‘free pass’ to uphill radiation but not conduction and convection, and is proven to have no real world atmospheric signal.

I actually a fan of Occam’s Razor, but not if it requires us to ignore things we know that happen, and which cannot be explained without the concept of back radiation.

Please kindly address my question and show us in the laws where radiation transport has different rules to conduction and convection and hereinafter try to forego disingenuous vacuum-based analogies as it ill behoves you.

My post already addresses this…did you read it?

----------------------

What are your favorites?

Posted by EliRabett at 11:49 AM

22 comments:

Anonymous said...

The one I prefer is this one, in response to Herman and Pielke in WUWT.

" EDT says:
July 23, 2010 at 8:27 am

While it doesn’t refute your argument, I want to point out that assertion #2, technically, is not correct. There are many sources of energy on Earth that are not sun related. Simply because it has mass, the Earth contains ~5^41 J of energy. It creates a vast gravitational well that imparts energy on all objects on the planet. Additionally, a lot of our energy sources have no ties to solar energy (e.g. fission reacts on Uranium which is, most likely, a remnant of a distant supernova).

However, if you were to say that the sun is the source of all BIOLOGICAL energy, I wouldn’t argue."

I like it a lot. In high ED-ucaTion, the relativistic terms must always ne used ;-)

MickeyMinnieMouseJon

27/7/10 1:03 PM
Thomas Palm said...

I can almost feel sorry for Roy Spencer, but then I remember that he is a supporter of "Intelligent Design" so if it was a discussion of evolution it would be him making the inane comments.

I wonder if the "skeptic" movement is going to implode from all these people who are willing to throw all of science out the window.

27/7/10 1:51 PM
Anonymous said...

How about this one on Spencer's site, emphasis added:

"Daniel,

Gerlich & Tscheuschner now have a peer reviewed paper out. There is no reasonable refutation of their paper. Some have tried and failed miserably to address what ia actually in their paper. Refuting strawmen does not make a valid presentation.

The only real disagreement is over whether there is a GLOBAL AVERAGE TEMPERATURE. I believe their stance was to the effect that since it varied so much and could not be tracked in a way to predict it, there was no basis for claiming we could compute a valid value."

I tried to post the links to the paper, the Halpern et.al. comment and the G&T reply on IJMPB to Daniel, but the comment got eaten by Roy's website, being mistaken for spam, I think. I've now reposted a link to the link collection on my (mini-)blog, awaiting moderation.

27/7/10 4:02 PM
EliRabett said...

What was amazing was the number of comments. A LOT of people did not get it. Appreciation to those who tried to stem the tide. Canutes all.

27/7/10 10:08 PM
J Bowers said...

Comment at WUWT:
"The more you people write, the more you reveal yourselves to be the pseudoscientists you are. Who’s paying you to push that line of crap? Whomever it is must be paying you well! Are you hierodules in the temple of CACC or CAGW?"

To Pielke Sr. of all people, who is even listed under the "Skeptical Views" blogroll list there. And they wonder why "the Hockey Team" don't saunter over there to address "serious issues".

28/7/10 5:08 AM
bill said...

Don't forget that other worthy now marked for the Blacklist - the TVMoB himself -

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/07/23/quantifying-the-greenhouse-effect/#comment-437657

28/7/10 6:54 AM
bill said...

"As one of the earlier commentators remarked, the responses to this post are almost enough to drive me to the other side of the argument. The authors put “greenhouse gases” in quotes and are criticized for misunderstanding greenhouses. They state that greenhouse gases raise temperatures leaving all other factors aside and are criticized for not considering other factors. They say that the Second Law is not violated and, good Lord, I don’t even follow what happens next!

Several people have suggested that the scientists should rephrase their explanations in terms that they can understand. Sorry, but this is clearly not going to be possible."

28/7/10 7:23 AM
John Mason said...

Following on from Bill (above) - here is TVMOB's comment followed by a comment from another which kind of says "Stop it! You're not denying hard enough!"

Monckton of Brenchley says:
July 23, 2010 at 9:13 am

I am delighted that this simple and clear but authoritative statement of the reality of the "greenhouse effect" has been posted here. Too many inaccurate statements to the effect that there is no greenhouse effect have been published recently, and they do not deserve to be given any credence. The true debate in the scientific community is not about whether there is a greenhouse effect (there is), nor about whether additional atmospheric CO2 causes warming (it does), nor about whether CO2 concentration is rising (it is), nor about whether we are the cause (we are), but about how fast CO2 concentration will rise (for a decade it has been rising at a merely-linear 2 ppmv/year, against the IPCC’s projection of an exponential increase at today’s emission rates), how much warming a given increase in CO2 concentration will be expected to cause (around a third of what the IPCC projects), whether attempting to mitigate future "global warming" will make any real difference to the climate (it won’t: remember Canute), whether the cost of forestalling each degree of "global warming" will be disproportionate to the climatic benefit (it will), and whether focused adaptation to any change in the climate, where and if necessary, will be orders of magnitude cheaper than trying to prevent that change from occurring in the first place (yes).


899 says:
July 23, 2010 at 10:56 pm

Monckton of Brenchley says:
July 23, 2010 at 9:13 am
[--snip--] The true debate in the scientific community is not about whether there is a greenhouse effect (there is), nor about whether additional atmospheric CO2 causes warming (it does),[--snip rest--]

No, CO2 does no such thing, and I challenge YOU to produce incontrovertible proof of any such contention.

You’ll be doing that, won’t you? Real soon now?

In the interim, there are those bits of ‘inconvenient truth’ referred to as the Vostok Ice Cores which COMPLETELY refute your statements: In every case of a temperature rise, CO2 lagged, i.e., followed AFTER an interval of time.

Consonantly, in every case where the temperature fell, the CO2 lagged the temperature fall.


Quite entertaining. Are we seeing the rolling-out of the "new" Official Opposition Theme? Because if so, some of the foot-soldiers sure ain't happy!

Cheers - John

28/7/10 10:01 AM
John Mason said...

Oops - sorry, double post. Something weird occurred - please delete one of them!

Cheers - John

28/7/10 10:03 AM
Martin Vermeer said...


No, CO2 does no such thing, and I challenge YOU to produce incontrovertible proof of any such contention.


Yep, a good question for Monckton.

Please share his explanation with us.

28/7/10 10:32 AM
Marion Delgado said...

I'm going to be the cynic here - yes, they've moved past stumping for outright science denialism and are all now firmly committed to AGW-mitigation OBSTRUCTIONISM. They have made a tactical decision that publicly abandoning outright science denialism will further The Cause, so, yeah.

28/7/10 10:35 AM
John Mason said...

Indeed, Marion. However contributor "899" is having none of the "New Obstructionism". Latest riposte:

"And finally, the whole “CO2 is a greenhouse gas” is a charade.

Think about this: If CO2 is supposed to reflect energy, then a specific portion of the Sun’s energy isn’t reflected as it sneaks past those pesky molecules.

Consonantly, the very same proportion of energy which hits the Earth must not be reflected by the CO2 back at the Earth’s surface, as it sneaks past those same molecules!"

I was almost tempted to reply putting things right, but sitting back and watching this dingdong is more amusing. Perhaps M'Lud will oblige?

Cheers - John

28/7/10 11:55 AM
Anonymous said...

Has 'consonantly' become the new 'ergo'? When someone spouts 'ergo" my BS filter immediately goes off.

Marion, thanks for your insight on the CP thread (the Curry train wreck one). I think that your insight here may too be on the mark.

Personally I find this whole GHG fiasco immensely entertaining (if not completely mind boggling) and it actually makes me hopeful. Hopeful that the deniers are starting some in-fighting and about to have their numbers significantly reduced into two factions-- "crazy" and "crazier".

FWIW, I posted over at Roy's place and offered him my support-- he is facing a outbreak of D-K on his site that makes the back plague look pleasant. One must give credit where credit is due, to Spencer in this case. I took the opportunity to state that I hope he is now more sympathetic to what climate scientists find themselves up against.

Might I humbly suggest that other bunnies offer Roy their support-- regardless of his position on evolution etc. he is right on the GHG effect. Not to mention the fact that it will drive the deniers crazy to see him openly getting support from so-called 'warmers'.

MapleLeaf

28/7/10 12:31 PM
Hank Roberts said...

It's hysterically funny to see The Lord castigated by those from the fringe far beyond his position. He's a warmist and didn't even know it.

28/7/10 1:34 PM
David Dardinger said...

You guys seem to be having fun, but actually the "Spencer Test" makes a good objective test between being a skeptic and being a denier. I've fought against know-nothing skepticism for a long time with little success. But the Web is what it is. If the members of the AGW crowd can't pick out the intelligent skeptics from the others, then that can be their test for being believable.

28/7/10 7:03 PM
Marion Delgado said...

John Mason: The critics are quite right. In fact, both you and Spencer strike me as the products of liberal parenting. No child of mine would ever get a blanket on a cold night by saying it would "warm them up." Blankets are not heaters! I believe a sleepless night of tossing, turning and huddling might teach them a thing or two about the difference between junk science and the truth.

28/7/10 9:08 PM
Marion Delgado said...

Also, I believe Hoc Variable Theory applies to these questions.

28/7/10 9:18 PM
EliRabett said...

Dave, it is more that the Spencers and Pielkes have driven the denial bandwagen and are now reaping their harvest. Schadenfreude is occasionally the only thing we have.

28/7/10 10:41 PM
a_ray_in_dilbert_space said...

David Dardinger,
Denial of all aspects of the science is not a prerequisite for being a denialist. Spencer still refuses to consider the evidencs. Likewise Pielke. They are denialists no less that the dimmest micro-Watt bulb.

29/7/10 8:42 AM
Anonymous said...

Poor Spencer. At one stage he had to point out that he's not a teacher, just a researcher. I rather thought that if he was teaching this class it would be gr4 comprehension. (Has anyone counted the number of times he's said "Did you read it?")

A couple of times I thought I'd have a crack at helping him out. My head nearly exploded. I admire him for his efforts on this one.

MinniesMum

29/7/10 10:11 AM
Anonymous said...

My favourite for the moment is

Theo Goodwin says:
July 23, 2010 at 9:19 am
Is it not true that your explanation is based on the assumption that CO2 molecules are distributed randomly in the atmosphere? Is it not true that there have been no experiments to test the assumption that CO2 molecules are randomly distributed throughout the atmosphere?

Houston we have a poe?

anaPest

29/7/10 3:08 PM
hardycross said...

"But radiation IS the only mode of energy transfer between the Earth and outer space."

huh. So wrong ...

There is other energy passing from the sun to the earth other than solar radiation. It is called "gravity" . It keeps the earth's core molten and rabbits that dig too deep get roasted.

30/7/10 10:33 PM

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