The world is a very confusing unpredictable place. Humans have, from the very beginning tried to create some sort of order and means of reducing its uncertainty.

They began by trying to find ways of ensuring the continuation of the regularities of the daily appearance of the sun, and of the annual cycle of the seasons. The responsible Gods had to be propitiated by sacrifice and ritual. The beginnings of this process are described in “The Golden Bough”¹ .

The rituals that developed are still in existence in the form of daily prayers and annual holidays for Easter and Christmas, absorbed by more recent religions.

By the time of the Middle Ages it was believed that the world was basically static and unchanging, apart from any deviation which could be blamed on the Gods and solved by prayer or sacrifice.

The beginnings of modern science came with Kepler, Galileo and Newton who found that the behaviour of solid bodies could be predicted successfully by a fairly simple mathematical model. In order to do this Newton had to invent friction and gravity. It became possible to predict the movements of the planets as well as solid objects on the earth. The principle of mathematical models took hold to the extent that it was believed that the entire universe resembled a huge clock operated by mathematical formulae.

The complacency was disturbed by Einstein’s theory of relativity and by Planck’s quantum theory, but the idea has survived even the discovery of evolution, and the structure of atoms, ..

Science depends on measurement and all measurement inevitably involves inaccuracy. It was only in early 20^th century that inaccuracy itself became subject to mathematical models. It is unfortunate that so many people who make use of them do not take care that their measurements comply with the assumptions of the model used.

The scientific study of the climate began, as with other disciplines, by the measurement of its properties. The science of meteorology is today amongst the most successful of all scientific institutions in its ability to measure and forecast local climate anywhere on the globe.

By comparison with other scientific disciplines it is faced with serious handicaps. Science demands that an experimental determination cannot be accepted unless it can be repeated, to an agreed level of accuracy, by an independent observer. Climate observations cannot be verified in this way. In addition, instruments, procedures, supervision, location are not standardised and the qualifications or the identity of the observer is often unknown. Recently the observer may just be automatic.

There are four key points that together invalidate any argument that changes in atmospheric carbon dioxide can alter the climate:

1. All heat has to be generated. (This is surely self-evident.)

2. All heat by itself always flows from hot to cold and never vice-versa (The irrefutable 2^nd law of thermodynamics.)

3. It is impossible to trap heat. (High temperatures can be generated in an oven or in a greenhouse, but only remain so long as heat is being generated.)

4. It therefore follows that all talk of ‘Man-made Global Warming’ has no basis in reality. For no gases generate heat, nor can they trap heat, least of all Carbon Dioxide.

The cornerstone of climate alarmism is that ‘Greenhouse Gases,’ in particular Carbon Dioxide, are susceptible to the infrared radiation that is emitted from the Earth and Oceans. I quote here from an email from my colleague Max Potter, an ardent warmist.

This light (from the sun) is mainly absorbed by land, sea etc and converted to heat. When the energy is reradiated it is emitted as much lower frequency infrared (below or lower frequency than red). It is this infrared radiation that is absorbed by the “greenhouse gases” (including water vapour), which warm the atmosphere.

That is correct. In layman’s language that means that the molecules of CO2 are warmed by this infrared. The Warmists then argue that there has been an increase in the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere caused by the burning of hydrocarbons. That is also correct. In percentage terms that can be construed as a big increase, but in fact it only seems big because the amount is still only a trace – less than 0.04{154653b9ea5f83bbbf00f55de12e21cba2da5b4b158a426ee0e27ae0c1b44117} of the gases in the atmosphere.

However they argue further as follows – I quote again from this email from a colleague – that Carbon Dioxide traps heat. Here is how my colleague argues: 

You ask: “If a Carbon Dioxide molecule traps heat, how long is that  heat trapped? Permanently? If not permanently, then how long?”Heat (vibrational energy) is continually being exchanged between molecules of gas as they collide. If there are more CO2 molecules they will absorb more infrared radiation and share it with all the other molecules, whether they are CO2, O2 or N2 thus warming the atmosphere,
i.e. “trapping heat”.

All the best, Max Potter

Can you see the fallacy in his argument? Or rather can you see how he has in fact conceded that there is no such thing as trapped heat? The warm molecules instantly pass their warmth to cooler molecules, thus vindicating the 2^nd law of thermodynamics, as heat by itself always flows from hot to cold. The fact that there may be a few more molecules makes no difference whatsoever. The heat is not trapped but is instantly passed on and on to cooler molecules.

Investors in wind farms around British and Danish coasts are facing financial ruin as a new study from the University of Olso affirms a catastrophic design oversight. Newly identifed flaws mean that all windmills currently in operation are in real danger of snapping like matchwood during severe storms. 

Because of the stringent censorship policy of Anthony Watts his award-winning WUWT science blog is not a place  you will find articles skeptical of the so-called greenhouse gas theory (GHE). In keeping with that ethos Willis Eschenbach’s recent guest article for Watts provides another defense of what critics say is pseudo-science.  Nonetheless, adverse comments there soon began to fly, which was unusual coming from loyal WUWT readers. Below is an edited version of Joe Postma’s impassioned refutation of that Eschenbach  piece. If only Mr. Eschenbach and Mr. Watts would engage Postma and other GHE critics in debate. There is no doubt WUWT readers have a growing appetite for it.

 

 

Dr. Pierre R. Latour, noted for his engineering prowess in helping design and develop the docking system for NASA’s Apollo space mission, turns film critic to lambast the latest film sold in the name of junk science. Latour’s eagle eye has landed on the new science-free climate movie: “Greedy Lying Bastards” (PG-13, 90 min) that trumpets alarmist fears over man-made global warming in the shrillest and most despairing tones.

Here is Dr. Latour’s round up:

If you find any physics linking CO₂ to temperature here, please advise.

If you discover ways to earn a living from global warming hysteria, you are smart.

If you discover glacial cycles have a period of about 100,000 years with an interglacial period of about 15,000, your discovery has been made already.

If you realize Chicago is covered by an ice sheet >1 mile thick 85{154653b9ea5f83bbbf00f55de12e21cba2da5b4b158a426ee0e27ae0c1b44117} of the time, you get it.

If you realize humanity prospers during interglacials, not glacials, you get it.

If you discover Earth’s temperature has stabilized at a local high since 1998, you can expect it to begin cooling soon. Maybe -15C. Because a new glacial has begun.

If you accept Lucy walked around Kenya 3 million years ago, you can conclude your ancestors survived 3,000,000/100,000 = 30 glacials.

Her ancestors appeared about 7 million years ago so they survived 4,000,000/100,000 = 40 more glacials. 30 + 40 = 70.

If you have enough faith in current humanity to believe we will survive at least one more = 100,000 years, year 102,013, you are a Greedy Lying Bastard, like me, with a new movie named after you.

Remedy? Invest in property near the Equator. This is not good or bad news, it’s just news.

Don’t be provocative. Have a fabulous day. Breathe your CO₂ easy.

 

 

In what is an exotic yet contentious subject, Stephen Crothers used a recent science conference in Albuquerque, New Mexico to deliver a robust attack on the cornerstone of modern cosmology. Crothers, who was forced to quit his PhD studies because he questioned ‘Big Bang’ physics offers an entertaining and compelling argument for his position.

This addresses the Big Question that has long perplexed scientists: what is the true driving force behind our Universe? But from the early 20^th Century a consensus was established around the ideas of Albert Einstein whose Theories of Relativity seemed so compelling. But in the new millenium the debate is once again hotting up. Opponents of such problematic ideas as Dark matter and Dark energy are espousing the notion of plasma cosmology (also known as the Electric Universe theory), and it is here where Crothers has taken center stage.

Crothers and others say there is increasing evidence to believe there are no isolated islands in the universe. They say all objects in space, from subatomic particles to galactic clusters, are connected by manifestations of the electric force acting in real time.

In this two part video presentation (part one, part two) we see that not only is the concept of an electric universe, its driving forces, and electro-magnetic mechanical properties far more readily understood than those of ‘Big Bang’ physics, picking holes in Black Holes is a lot of fun, too. As Crothers quips during his presentation, “When quantum physicists don’t understand things, they postulate a new particle.”

Critics of the greenhouse gas theory and it’s supposed role in climate change have presented a fresh analysis of a CIA report that suggests climatologists created a false scientific basis to link global warming to levels of carbon dioxide. An assumption that wrongly fixed cloud cover as a constant factor encouraged scientists to incorrectly assume changes in CO2 rather than changes in cloud cover determine temperatures.

Researchers at Principia Scientific International have put under the microscope an important but widely overlooked 1970’s U.S. government climate report by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). ‘A Study of Climatological Research as it Pertains to Intelligence Problems’ offers a wealth of evidence to prove the greenhouse gas effect (GHE) was disregarded by the best brains in climatology and the document shows no indication as to why the GHE was trumpeted as the accepted ‘theory’ on climate a mere half dozen years later. The CIA in-depth study dates from August 1974 and was uncovered by Maurizio Morabito in 2009 and despite tens of thousands of words not one mention is made anywhere of a supposed greenhouse gas effect. [1]

The CIA study was regarded by the U.S. Government as a highly accurate appraisal of the best peer-reviewed climate science of the day on concerns of global cooling. This document starkly contradicts a report by Peterson, Connolley and Fleck who misused the American Meteorological Society (AMS) in September 2008 to paint a different picture about global warming. [2]

Independent climate analysts crunch the numbers to prove that hurricanes are a more powerful driver of climate than so-called greenhouse gases. Dr. Pierre R Latour, a leading industry expert in thermodynamics, has peer-reviewed the latest newsletter from long-time climate skeptic, Dr. Vincent Gray and affirmed Gray’s calculations to be correct.

Dr. Latour, who first made his name assisting in the engineering of NASA’s Apollo space mission agrees that Dr. Gray’s analysis points to the greenhouse gas effect (GHE) being trivial (if, indeed, it does exist) when compared to the actual energy manifested in hurricanes. Gray is noted as the only expert reviewer of all five reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Latour, Principia Scientific International’s (PSI) lead expert on thermodynamics affirms what other industry experts had long suspected. “We know that hurricanes can never create or consume energy. All they do is transform the energy received into the Earth’s system and move it around,” says Dr. Latour. Unlike climatologists Latour is an engineer trained to the highest standards in thermodynamics. He can’t understand why modern academics are incapable of discerning what an earlier generation of climate researchers knew to be true: carbon dioxide is just not a factor at all in the climate equation.

Dr. Pierre Latour has peer-reviewed Dr. Gray’s numbers and confirms that “This analysis supports my long held contention measuring the average temperature of the whole atmosphere is impossible. Measuring any change in that average over years or decades is even harder.” It is the overwhelming power of evaporation, condensation, rain, storms and wind energy – seen at their most dramatic in hurricanes – that tell us the hydrological cycle is the key, not any trace gas like CO2. “Water is the great leveler in the system,” Latour insists, “It all averages out if you wait long enough. Turbulent fluid flow is well known.”

Lord Nigel Lawson, Chancellor in Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s government in the 1980’s, issues a public statement that Sir Paul Nurse, the President of the Royal Society, is a global warming liar.

In his boldest attack yet on the frontman of Britain’s crumbling climate alarmist establishment Lord Lawson has thrown down a gauntlet that Nurse is not likely to pick up.  Lawson, former holder of the second highest office of government, has responded to Paul Nurse’s wild accusations that Lawson was cherrypicking data when he stated that global temperatures have been flatlining for 17 years. Lawson’s open letter published by the Global Warming Policy Foundation (February, 27, 2013) where Lawson is Chairman, states:

“You [Nurse] claim that I “would choose two points and say ‘look, no warming’s taking place’, knowing that all the other points that you chose in the 20 years around it would not support his case”. That is a lie.”

Sir Paul Nurse, who won the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physiology/Medicine, is described in the letter as more a  “shop steward for some kind of scientists’ closed shop” rather than the figurehead of Britain’s most prestigious science body.

Britain’s deeply unpopular Climate Change Act (2008) may be set for repeal as another politician joins the growing number of MP’s aghast at the damage it is having on the nation’s ailing economy.

Conservative Member of Parliament, Douglas Carswell’s mea culpa today (February 25, 2013) shows dignity and acceptance of the weight of evidence conflicting with the already scientifically dubious notion of human-caused global warming.  “My biggest regret as an MP is that I failed to oppose the 2008 Climate Change Act. It was a mistake. I am sorry,” said Carswell on his blog.

The announcement comes hot on the heels of last week’s surprise admission by Rajendra Pachuari, the UN’s head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Dr. Pachauri conceded that we are now into a 17-year pause in global temperature rises, as confirmed recently by Britain’s Met Office. Even NASA’s most strident climate doomsayer, Dr. James Hansen concedes there has been “a pause” in any temperature rise.

An incredible new paper in the reputed Global and Planetary Journal using freely available government data may be about to cause an unwelcome storm for believers in the greenhouse gas theory and the ‘green’ carbon reductions industry. It’s publication is accompanied by a surge in highly-credentialed scientists joining dissenting fledgling science body, Principia Scientific International.*

Norwegian scientists led by Professor Ole Humlum of the University of Oslo analyzed measurements of atmospheric carbon dioxide and compared them to temperatures with an astonishing result that throws serious doubt on claims that climate change is carbon related. If verified by other scientists Humlum’s study will confirm the findings of researchers at Principia Scientific International (PSI) who claim they have already refuted the greenhouse gas theory.

NOAA and HADCrut CO2 levels graph (click to enlarge)

The scientists investigated the phase relation (leads/lags) between atmospheric carbon dioxide and global temperatures using standard data series for the period January 1980 to December 2011. They found that changes in global atmospheric CO2 follow 11–12 months behind changes in global sea surface temperature and 9.5–10 months behind changes in global air surface temperature. The findings conflict with the consensus view concerning the greenhouse gas ‘theory’ that says the opposite should happen with temperatures supposedly being driven by any rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2 levels are up 40 percent in recent decades).

by Professor Cliff Ollier

School of Earth and Environment, University of Western Australia. 

To demonise CO₂ yet again, a false claim is that human production of CO₂ will cause the oceans to become acid. ‘Acid’ is an emotive word to the general public, which is why it is seized upon by the alarmists in their search for yet another scare. In reality increasing CO₂ makes the ocean become ‘less alkaline’, but never ‘acid’.

pH is a measurement of the amount of hydrogen ion concentration in a solution, the log of the hydrogen ion concentration with the sign changed. Because it is a log scale it is very hard to move a pH of 8.2 to 7.0, which is neutral.

The pH needs to be less than 7 to be ‘acid’, and this has not happened through at least the past 600 million years because it would dissolve limestones, and limestone have been deposited in the sea and not re-dissolved in the sea through all that time.

Many marine organisms need CO₂ to make their coral skeletons, carbonate shells and so on. Corals also have symbiotic plants within their flesh that use CO₂ in photosynthesis.

In the ongoing intellectual war where the traditional scientific method is battling the rise of “post normal science” the Alliance for Wise Energy Decisions (AWED) has struck a blow for real science. Engineers expose ten unfixable wind turbine problems that make then unreliable not renewable.

AWED spokesman, John Droz Jr. a qualified physicist and environmentalist steps up his organization’s campaign to ensure policymakers are presented with the cold hard facts on so-called “renewables.”

Having established a powerful grassroots network of informed individuals and organizations interested in improving national, state, and local energy & environmental policies AWED has hit on the correct nomenclature for that fair weather energy source: wind. Rather than putting wind farms in the “renewables” category AWED found they are very much the “unreliables.”

The problem, says, Droz, is that “Instead of a science-based approach, our energy and environmental policies are typically written by those who stand to economically or politically profit from them. As a result, anything genuinely science-based in these policies is usually inadvertent and accidental.”

Eminent sea level experts from the Indian subcontinent are pulling the plug on alarmist media claims that the region is set to be awash with ever-rising sea levels due to man-made global warming.

In their sights are such science news stories typified by ‘Climate change forcing thousands in Bangladesh into slums of Dhaka’ appearing in The Star, Canada (February 17, 2013). Last week we reported how Dr. Nils-Axel Mörner, a Swedish scientist and ‘The Golden Chondrite of Merit’ award winner from Algarve University, latched onto a similar junk story by The Star touting that sea level rises are due to humans.

This week Dr. Mörner, adviser to Principia Scientific International on sea levels, brings out the big guns to shoot down misguided journalists who continue to present a one-sided story. Particularly galling to the experts are those claims that climate change is due to humans, makes people poor and forces them to live in the slums of Bangladesh and India. The Star’s article supposedly addresses sea level rises but disingenuously asserts, “Every monsoon, when the slum is overrun with rainwater, cholera and malaria outbreaks are common.”

By Prof. Roger Pielke Jr.

I have just participated in a lengthy Twitter exchange with Marshall Shepherd (@DrShephard2013), a professor at the University of Georgia and President of the American Meteorological Society. The occasion for the exchange was Dr. Shepherd’s presentation yesterday at a Congressional Briefing sponsored by the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works (his prepared remarks can be found here in PDF). The briefing focused on “the latest trends and scientific evidence related to the growing impacts associated with climate change.”

Three other scientists testified at the briefing, but I am not interested in what they had to say. Shepherd’s remarks are of interest because he is the President of a major scientific society. He was not at the briefing to present his personal opinions, but rather in his role as a leader and representative of the scientific community. Thus, in my view of the obligations of such a role, he had a duty to play it straight.

Unfortunately, as is so often a case when leaders in the climate science community find themselves before an audience of policy makers, on extreme events they go rogue, saying all sorts of things with little or no scientific basis. Even if the scientist includes many accurate statements in his/her remarks (such as the reality of significant risks of human-caused climate change), the presence of horsemeat ruins the lasagne.

By Dan Pelton

Staff Reporter, Orangeville Citizen

As this was being written Tuesday night, the area was being drenched by what looked remarkably like an April shower, with the temperature soaring into double digits. But when you step outside to pick up your paper this afternoon, the forecasters say you will be in a paradise … for polar bears.

So far, the winter of 2012-13 has featured temperatures both well above and the normal high of about –4º C. There have been few days when they were actually normal. While some experts are pointing to climate change as a pivotal factor in weather fluctuations, Environment Canada’s senior climatologist says temperature changes are par for the course.

“There’s a difference between climate and temperature,” explained David Phillips in an interview.

“The wild swings in temperature have had nothing to do with climate. It’s about where the winds come from.”

The recent warming trend, for example, was caused by breezes blowing in from the southern United States.