[lit-ideas] Re: global luke-warming
- From: Teemu Pyyluoma <teme17@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 12 Apr 2006 11:31:22 -0700 (PDT)
Richard Lindzen's cries about alarmism are often made
and seldom substantiated, writing about Lindzen's UK
testimony Gavin Schmidt notes that:
> Throughout his testimony, Lindzen refers to the
global warming 'alarmists'. In my dictionary an
'alarmist' is defined as 'a person who alarms others
needlessly'. However, Lindzen appears to define as
'alarmism' anything that links human activities to
climate change. For instance, when discussing the
statement from the NRC (2001) report (which he
co-authored): The changes observed over the last
several decades are likely mostly due to human
activities, but we cannot rule out that some
significant part of these changes is also a reflection
of natural variability., he states that "To be sure,
this statement is leaning over backwards to encourage
the alarmists". To my mind, this statement is actually
a fair assessment of both the NRC report, and IPCC
report to which it was referring. To claim that this
is 'alarmist' is such a gross overuse of the term as
to make it useless except as a rhetorical device. <
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006/02/richard-lindzens-hol-testimony/#more-222
Few comments on the Lindzen writes in the Opinion
Journal:
> To understand the misconceptions perpetuated about
climate science and the climate of intimidation, one
needs to grasp some of the complex underlying
scientific issues. First, let's start where there is
agreement. The public, press and policy makers have
been repeatedly told that three claims have widespread
scientific support: Global temperature has risen about
a degree since the late 19th century; levels of CO2 in
the atmosphere have increased by about 30% over the
same period; and CO2 should contribute to future
warming. These claims are true. However, what the
public fails to grasp is that the claims neither
constitute support for alarm nor establish man's
responsibility for the small amount of warming that
has occurred. <
Yet he completely fails to tell us why we should not
think man is responsible. What he is probably after is
this (from the same RealClimate page):
> Lindzen accepts the main principle of the greenhouse
effect, that increasing greenhouse gases (like CO2)
will cause a radiative forcing that, all other things
being equal, will cause the surface to warm. He uses
an odd measure of its effectiveness though, claiming
that a doubling of CO2 will lead to a '2%' increase in
the greenhouse effect. How has he defined the
greenhouse effect here? Well, a doubling of CO2 is
about a 4 W/m2 forcing at the tropopause, which is
roughly 2% of the total upward longwave (LW) (~240
W/m2). But does that even make sense as a definition
of the greenhouse effect? Not really. On a planet with
no greenhouse effect (but similar albedo) the upward
LW would also be 240 W/m2, but the absorbed LW in the
atmosphere would be zero, so it would make much more
sense to define the greenhouse effect as the amount of
LW absorbed (~150 W/m2). In which case, doubling of
CO2 is initially slightly more*, but as soon as any
feedbacks (particularly water vapour or ice albedo
changes) kick in, that would increase. Due to the
non-linearities in the system, you certainly can't
multiply the total greenhouse effect of ~33 C by 2% to
get any sensible estimate of the climate sensitivity.
So it's not clear what relevance the '2%' number has
except to make the human additions to the greenhouse
effect seem negligible.<
Lindzen continues:
> It isn't just that the alarmists are trumpeting
model results that we know must be wrong. It is that
they are trumpeting catastrophes that couldn't happen
even if the models were right as justifying costly
policies to try to prevent global warming.
> If the models are correct, global warming reduces
the temperature differences between the poles and the
equator. When you have less difference in temperature,
you have less excitation of extratropical storms, not
more. <
There is considerable debate on whether increased
hurricane activity can be linked to global warming,
precisely because it doesn't exactly fit the models.
That this is a reason to ditch the models all together
is nonsense, compare to what RealClimate once again
writes with Lindzen's claims of alarmism:
> Basically, although everyone acknowledges that there
are data problems early in the record, it seems clear
that there has been a global rise of the most intense
hurricanes over the last 30 years and the most obvious
explanation is that this is related to the
contemporaneous increases in tropical SST [sea surface
temperature] in each basin. However, the magnitude of
the correlation cannot yet be explained in terms of
our basic theoretical understanding, and is
significantly stronger than some modelling work has
suggested it should be. Possibly the theory needs work
(hurricanes are a complicated business!) or there are
other factors at play that haven't yet been
considered. Since the SST changes are global, and
almost certainly tied to greenhouse gas driven global
warming, there are the beginnings of a corroborated
link between increases in hurricane intensity and GW -
however, so far there are only a couple of ducks in a
row. <
Lindzen also digs up the good old Barton questions to
Mann:
> Earlier this year, Texas Rep. Joe Barton issued
letters to paleoclimatologist Michael Mann and some of
his co-authors seeking the details behind a
taxpayer-funded analysis that claimed the 1990s were
likely the warmest decade and 1998 the warmest year in
the last millennium. Mr. Barton's concern was based on
the fact that the IPCC had singled out Mr. Mann's work
as a means to encourage policy makers to take action.
And they did so before his work could be replicated
and tested--a task made difficult because Mr. Mann, a
key IPCC author, had refused to release the details
for analysis. <
Compare the last statement, that he refused to
"release the details" to Mann's detailed response to
Barton at
http://www.realclimate.org/Mann_response_to_Barton.pdf
And so on.
Lindzen is one of the few skeptics who is actually a
respectable researcher, which is the only reason
people
even bother to read him. However, I see no reason to
take him seriously as a commentator on politics of
climate change, and ironically enough he seems to fit
the cariacature he paints of a scientist twisting the
science for political ends.
Cheers,
Teemu
Helsinki, Finland
--- Paul Stone <pas@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
> From the wall street journal
>
> http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110008220
>
> Climate of Fear
> Global-warming alarmists intimidate dissenting
> scientists into silence.
>
> BY RICHARD LINDZEN
> Wednesday, April 12, 2006 12:01 a.m. EDT
>
> p
>
> ##########
> Paul Stone
> pas@xxxxxxxx
> Kingsville, ON, Canada
>
>
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