Greenpeace co-founder: No scientific proof humans dominant cause of warming climate

[jem]

you are such a troll loser.
the stats come from the study by doran itself.
you were just presented with the link 2 or 3 days ago.

I present facts and then you just respond with lies and adhoms.

No, you are an idiot, it is 97% of the climatologists and essentially all the world's science organizations.

You are a lying piece of shit douchebag.

 

[piezoe]

http://www.ibtimes.com/patrick-moor...tific-proof-climate-change-caused-humans-poll

Canadian ecologist Patrick Moore, known as one of the co-founders of the activist group Greenpeace, has a history of sharply dissenting from policies supported by major environmental groups, including the one he helped create. Moore’s latest departure is to assert that climate change, particularly the gradual warming of Earth’s surface temperature over the last century, is not caused by humans.

during an appearance before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee on Tuesday. “If there were such a proof it would be written down for all to see. No actual proof, as it is understood in science, exists.”

The ecologist, who worked with Greenpeace from 1971 to 1986 and left “not necessarily by his own choice,” went on to found Greenspirit Strategies, an environmental and sustainability consulting firm in Vancouver.

“After 15 years in the top committee I had to leave as Greenpeace took a sharp turn to the political left, and began to adopt policies that I could not accept from my scientific perspective,” Moore said. “Climate change was not an issue when I abandoned Greenpeace, but it certainly is now.”

Moore argued that the sophisticated computer models scientists use to predict patterns in global climate are “not a crystal ball.” He maintained that the claim by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that humans are “extremely likely” to be the dominant cause of global warming since the mid-20th century is bogus, given that the scale used to measure probability was constructed by IPCC members themselves.

“Perhaps the simplest way to expose the fallacy of ‘extreme certainty’ is to look at the historical record. …When modern life evolved over 500 million years ago, CO2 was more than 10 times higher than today, yet life flourished at this time. Then an ice age occurred 450 million years ago when CO2 was 10 times higher than today. There is some correlation, but little evidence, to support a direct causal relationship between CO2 and global temperature through the millennia,” Moore argued.

Moore said this “fundamentally contradicts” the notion that man’s CO2 emissions are causing the planet to warm.

To understand Moore's position you must first understand his words, namely: “There is no scientific proof that human emissions of carbon dioxide are the dominant cause of the minor warming of the Earth’s atmosphere over the past 100 years,” Moore said.

This is not the same as saying: "... climate change, particularly the gradual warming of Earth’s surface temperature over the last century, is not caused by humans."

This last statement is taken directly from the first paragraph of the post.

The two statements are by no means the same. I'm guessing that Moore would not have been be so foolish as to make, at this point, the statement in the first paragraph of the posted article. That statement must surely be the author's inept paraphrase of Moore's words .

It is possible that human activities are contributing to global warming. But we don't know yet whether they are or are not.

Recent data analyses have cast doubt on the original hypothesis posed by Hansen in the mid-eighties. Namely that Human emissions of CO2 are contributing to significant warming. But, neither has that possibility been ruled out, though it is looking more and more as though it will be. There is, however, other possible human contributions to warming.

It is far to soon to be jumping to conclusions. This is a very complicated issue.

Moore, and many well-educated in science, would say that, regardless, the prudent thing to do is be aware that Human activities could be contributing, and it only makes sense to be good stewards of our environment.

It may be many years before we achieve a semiquantitative understanding how all of the factors contributing to our climate interact. It is very refreshing to read that Moore argued: "There is some correlation, but little evidence, to support a direct causal relationship between CO2 and global temperature through the millennia.” This is a cautious, prudent and wise statement. As a matter of fact, it is exactly my own position on this matter.

I can't understand why any well trained meteorologist or atmospheric physicist would assert, at this point, that there is a high degree of certainty that anthropomorphic CO2 is causing significant global warming; yet I am aware that some have.

I only trust the opinions of experts, and just being a scientist does not make one a climate expert. The expert opinions are mixed. There is no compelling conclusion as yet. These issues can't be settled by consensus among scientists any more than by consensus among the public, i.e., polls. Consensus means nothing in science; the consensus was once that the Earth was flat and that the sun orbited the Earth.

 

[piezoe]

Wow. He's a complete idiot. Buffoon even. Yet another denier bonehead.

"There is some correlation, but little evidence, to support a direct causal relationship between CO2 and global temperature through the millennia,” Moore argued."

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/globalwarming/temperature-change.html

As you know, the high correlation between CO2 and temperature does not in itself prove cause and effect. First you have to decide what the dependent and independent variables are. For example CO2 could be the independent variable and T the dependent, or vice versa, or both could be dependent variables. Any of these three relationships could result in correlation between CO2 and Temperature. Why is the Most CO2 appearing in regions of the Earth's surface where man has the least influence. Does that concern you? Does the recent finding that CO2 has actually been up to 15 times higher in concentration before industrialization concern you. Or is all this new information wrong?

 

[futurecurrents]

To understand Moore's position you must first understand his words, namely: “There is no scientific proof that human emissions of carbon dioxide are the dominant cause of the minor warming of the Earth’s atmosphere over the past 100 years,” Moore said.

This is not the same as saying: "... climate change, particularly the gradual warming of Earth’s surface temperature over the last century, is not caused by humans."

This last statement is taken directly from the first paragraph of the post.

The two statements are by no means the same. I'm guessing that Moore would not have been be so foolish as to make, at this point, the statement in the first paragraph of the posted article. That statement must surely be the author's inept paraphrase of Moore's words .

It is possible that human activities are contributing to global warming. But we don't know yet whether they are or are not.

Recent data analyses have cast doubt on the original hypothesis posed by Hansen in the mid-eighties. Namely that Human emissions of CO2 are contributing to significant warming. But, neither has that possibility been ruled out, though it is looking more and more as though it will be. There is, however, other possible human contributions to warming.

It is far to soon to be jumping to conclusions. This is a very complicated issue.

Moore, and many well-educated in science, would say that, regardless, the prudent thing to do is be aware that Human activities could be contributing, and it only makes sense to be good stewards of our environment.

It may be many years before we achieve a semiquantitative understanding how all of the factors contributing to our climate interact. It is very refreshing to read that Moore argued: "There is some correlation, but little evidence, to support a direct causal relationship between CO2 and global temperature through the millennia.” This is a cautious, prudent and wise statement. As a matter of fact, it is exactly my own position on this matter.

I can't understand why any well trained meteorologist or atmospheric physicist would assert, at this point, that there is a high degree of certainty that anthropomorphic CO2 is causing significant global warming; yet I am aware that some have.

I only trust the opinions of experts, and just being a scientist does not make one a climate expert. The expert opinions are mixed. There is no compelling conclusion as yet. These issues can't be settled by consensus among scientists any more than by consensus among the public, i.e., polls. Consensus means nothing in science; the consensus was once that the Earth was flat and that the sun orbited the Earth.

Yes we DO know that man is causing global warming. You are an idiot.

That's why these guys and essentially every science org in the world say this or something similar. Do you know what "geophysical" means.

American Geophysical Union

"Human‐induced climate change requires urgent action. Humanity is the major influence on the global climate change observed over the past 50 years. Rapid societal responses can significantly lessen negative outcomes." (Adopted 2003, revised and reaffirmed 2007, 2012, 2013)5

 

[futurecurrents]

As you know, the high correlation between CO2 and temperature does not in itself prove cause and effect. First you have to decide what the dependent and independent variables are. For example CO2 could be the independent variable and T the dependent, or vice versa, or both could be dependent variables. Any of these three relationships could result in correlation between CO2 and Temperature. Why is the Most CO2 appearing in regions of the Earth's surface where man has the least influence. Does that concern you? Does the recent finding that CO2 has actually been up to 15 times higher in concentration before industrialization concern you. Or is all this new information wrong?

They are co -dependent bonehead. The feedback loop between the two is what caused the large swings. This is basic climate science that apparently you don't know the first thing about.

It's amazing how can you sound so knowledgeable while actually being completely clueless. Truly astounding.

 

[futurecurrents]

"emissions of carbon dioxide are the dominant cause of the minor warming of the Earth’s atmosphere over the past 100 years,”

This cannot be said with large confidence. Change it to forty years and the confidence level goes to 95%

 

[futurecurrents]

Oh piehole. You know why we know man has caused temps to rise? Because CO2 is the earth's dominant long term greenhouse gas, largely controls the planet's temperature and we have raised levels by 40% and the temps are going up. Even you can understand something that simple.

 

[fhl]

 

[piezoe]

Oh piehole. You know why we know man has caused temps to rise? Because CO2 is the earth's dominant long term greenhouse gas, largely controls the planet's temperature and we have raised levels by 40% and the temps are going up. Even you can understand something that simple.

Actually water vapor is the dominate greenhouse gas. CO2 is secondary. But you wrote "long-term", and if you meant by "long-term" that CO2 had a smaller dC/dt then water vapor at any point on Earth, then OK.

Man may be causing global warming, but Moore and I are correct in that this has not yet been proven. Too many unanswered questions at this point. The main defect in the current popular hypothesis is that the Earth's sinking and sourcing of CO2 is huge and dwarfs the amount of anthropomorphic CO2 released. Any hypothesis has to be consistent with that. When Hansen first proposed his hypothesis he would have had no idea of what the actual natural sourcing and sinking was, other than a wild guess of course. Now we have pretty good ball park estimates. Satellite data collection, and surface monitoring, have really moved the science forward.

There are, of course, obvious feedback loops and considerable lag or hysteresis involved with these loops. That's just one of the many things that makes this entire business so perplexing and difficult.

Here is a quote from your nice NOAA article: " While it might seem simple to determine cause and effect between carbon dioxide and climate from which change occurs first, or from some other means, the determination of cause and effect remains exceedingly difficult. Furthermore, other changes are involved in the glacial climate, including altered vegetation, land surface characteristics, and ice-sheet extent. "

[the underlining and italics are mine of course.]

By the way the nice chart you posted shows a cyclical nature to CO2 and T variation. From that chart alone, of course you can't say anything about man's possible contribution. We do seem to be right on schedule, however, and near a temperature CO2 peak.

It's an excellent article. It avoids the issue of anthropomorphic contributions because, of course, the data presented doesn't "speak" to that issue. Here is another quote:
"Finally, the paleo data reveal that climate change is not just about temperature. As carbon dioxide has changed in the past, many other aspects of climate changed too. During glacial times, snow-lines were lower, continents were drier, and the tropical monsoons were weaker. Some of these changes may be independent, others tightly coupled to the changing level of carbon dioxide. "

I want you to note carefully that "tightly coupled" means just that, and one should not read cause and effect into such a statement. We haven't ruled out a possible significant effect of man, but neither have we ruled it in.

Another thing I'd like to mention to you is the possible error in determining, in these ice cores, the actual deuterium and CO2 levels that existed at a particular time. First, there is the time-depth error, and then there is the error associated with correcting for diffusion of both CO2 and deuterium. The diffusion coefficients are very small at those temperatures, but we are talking 10⁵ years! One of Salby's great contributions is to critically look at the diffusion correction. Is it possible that the very first core data was not corrected for diffusion! I wonder. It's conceivable that D and CO2 diffusion rates in ice were not even available then. It might have been assumed that diffusion at those temperatures in ice was so slow that it was not important. But that would be wrong! (I haven't tried to look that up, do you know?)

Even if the numbers aren't quite right because of errors in the diffusion correction, or error in time-depth, that doesn't matter much as far as the pattern is concerned. It's the pattern that I find so compelling. (The errors in determining the CO2 and deuterium in the core samples are completely negligible compared to the other error contributions.)

Your enthusiasm is appreciated, but unfortunately Mother Nature is blind to it.

 

[jem]