Climate change skeptic turned proponent

[Surgenator]

Muller's study focusses on the overall deviation from natural. The fact that temperature follows so closely to CO2 rise is surprising. But considering the amount of CO2 increased in the atmosphere, it is not that surprising.

The human produced greenhouse gasses are the major/primary driver of present day climate change. The scientific community agrees.

No, what he found was a correlation. He did not prove anything. Everyone knows there's a correlation if you look hard enough.

Yes he found a strong correlation that didn't exist before humans started to dump loads of GHG into the atmosphere. That suggest causation. For it to be coincidence is ridiculous, the correlations is too good. I have yet to hear another viable theory that explains so nicely the warming we're seeing.

My point however remains that without a negative feedback mechanism (and I don't believe that there is one) it's just a logarithmic increase - and that's frankly what people should expect. With a mythical negative feedback mechanism programmed into the computers it spits out exponential temperature rise which is ridiculous. And why do you suppose they think that there's a negative feedback mechanism? Because without one they can't get the CO2 increase to correlate to the temperature rise of the 20th century. It's bad science, it's one assumption after another.

First off, the negative feedback mechanism would cool the earth not heat it. So without a negative feedback mechanism we should expect an exponential rise in temperature.

What part of the negative feedback mechanism you don't believe exist: surface temperature increase -> increase evaporation -> more low clouds -> reflects more sunlight into space -> surface temperature decreases?

There is also a positive feedback mechanism that fights against the negative feedback. The two are not at equilibrium. The positive one is winning and thats why we are seeing an almost exponential rise in temperature.

What is not agreed upon is the degree each GHG contributes.

The negative feedback loop depends on the models. Muller's study doesn't address it directly. His study is a comparison of before and after. IPCC is better at handling this question since it takes into account all the intricacies that affect climate.

Well it obviously directs it since without it CO2 cannot be the driving factor.

CO2 is a GHG. How do other GHG direct it, but not the CO2 GHG? How can you get such a high correlation between CO2 rise and temperature rise?

Predictions are hard to make when you're working with a choatic system which is what climate is. On the quantitive level, IPCC's predictions are wrong. However, they are not wrong qualitatively. They're model's predictions and data are all pointing to the same conclusion, the earth is warming.

Well firstly chaos theory itself is an outdated model. Under the chaos world view everything is reducible to its core components; however we now know that isn't the case. For example you have a near limitless choice of meals you can decide to eat tomorrow all of which will have exactly the same net effect; you also have another set of near limitless meals that will have a slightly different yet shared effect, etc. Chaos theory can't explain that. But we do know with all probability that you will eat something tomorrow - what it is isn't as important as the fact that you do it. These are mechanisms that override chaos, that function perfectly fine despite the appearance of there being a chaotic environment.

No, chaos theory is NOT an outdated model of climate. Chaos theory does not apply to meal selection because meal selection doesn't dramatically depend on what you eat before and taste preference are not interdependent. So your analogy doesn't work. Climate is affected by temperature, temperature is affected by CO2, and CO2 is affected by the ocean water temperature. There is just one interdependent part of climate. The interdependency is what makes it chaotic.

You can go to this link for an in depth talk about MWP. The summary is that whatever caused the MWP is NOT what is causing our warming period.

Well that's rubbish. The MWP we have to assume was a global event - are you really telling me that you think ice on Greenland melted to a point that Farmers in the middle ages left behind their homes that are now frozen in permafrost that hasn't thawed since, and that it was a local event?

We don't have to assume anything. The temperatures of the earth at the MWP were measured.

We employ the global proxy data set used by (13) comprising more than a thousand tree-ring, ice core, coral, sediment, and other as-sorted proxy records spanning the ocean and land regions of both hemispheres over the past 1500 years

source

So the MWP wasn't as warm as you suspected. It was a regional warming, not global warming.

But look, the thing is that everything that climate scientists could look at to be causing it led them nowhere - in fact they even proved it wasn't due to sunspot activity or solar flares. So you have a very dramatic event with no known cause to this day. So until you work out for certain what caused it how can you possibly say it's "not the same thing that's causing present temperature rise"?

We have this very well known cause, antropogenic GHG. The other theories were not able to reproduce the heating trend we're seeing.

CO2, Methane and Black Carbon DO cause an increase in global surface temperature, but they are not the driving force of climate change.

And your proof for this is where?

I don't understand what how you can doubt that. Anthropogenic GHG are driving warming, so not producing them will slow down warming. When it will slow down and start cooling again is another question entirely.

Well because it's a fact. Let's say, as I said before, that I accept the science and that there's going to be a 2-4 degree increase in temperature between now and 2100, and that CO2 is 50% responsible, Methane and Black Carbon mostly making up the other 50%.

Australia's emissions are about 1.1% of the global total. Let's say we cut our emissions by 50%. Right that would contribute 0.6% to the CO2 component, and only 0.3% to reducing global warming in total; thus the net effect would be that we reduce global warming's trend by 0.006 to 0.012 degrees. That isn't even measurable. So the net effect is that we would make an immeasurable difference.

Where are you getting your numbers for the decrease in temperature? Plus, your argument is "our instruments can't measure it then it's not worth it." That is ridiculous.