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Browser-based climate change simulation

en-roads.climateinteractive.org

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Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#221

Post by lopmotr »

hanniabu wrote: post #210
lopmotr wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are there really that many people who think climate change isn't happening or isn't caused by those factors? That sounds like a strawman.

There are definitely a lot. If you haven't experienced this personally then you must live in a heavily liberal area.

I'm sure there are some extreme people. But when I look at right-wing TV and journalism, I don't see climate change denial, nor human-causing-it denial. Instead, I see denial of the severity of the uncertain effects, criticism of the exaggerations of activists and criticism of the proposed policies around it. I've met people who would likely be called deniers because they say things like "it's not going to affect me or my kids, so I don't care". I think this attitude of accepting it but not being worried about it is extremely common and also commonly confused with denialism.

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#222

Post by EdSharkey »

imtringued wrote: post #214
EdSharkey wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> > Fact 2: Solar output has increased recently > Citation needed. Maybe they meant 'recently' as in geologic time and not "since 2000"? I think it's interesting that solar energy and magnetic fields and cosmic energy fluctuates from year to year. I think these primary inputs to the system not staying constant would make it impossible to model climate such that the model could be an accurate predictive tool. This par…

>This particular tool seems rigged to show a certain outcome, and I feel bad for folks here who are frustrated by its +1C floor on temperature rise by the end of the simulation. That (crude) part of the design was probably meant to frustrate and/or panic people into taking action. What? No it makes you feel like the whole thing is pointless because people aren't even willing to take moderate action. If we drop everyt…

Argh, does this web app really engender such feelings of hopelessness in you or is this an act? I'm sorry either way.

Don't believe the hype! The +1C is a lie, propaganda. ;(

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#224

Post by adventskalender »

mistermann wrote: post #207
svara wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "X% of scientists agree" point is of course not a scientific argument, and I understand how it could be taken the wrong way, either as an appeal to authority or as a cheap regurgitation of canned talking points. But go ahead and read the full discussion here. I think a lack of patience with the dishonest discussion tactics used by poorly informed people arguing against the scientific state of the art is totally u…

> The "X% of scientists agree" point is of course not a scientific argument But it's presented as such. Is this, and similar examples, a "big deal"? Another way of asking that is: is trust a big deal? And the answer is: we do not know - but guessing at such things doesn't seem like a terribly prudent strategy when the stakes are this high. > and I understand how it could be taken the wrong way Can, and is , regularly…

"is trust a big deal? And the answer is: we do not know"

Trust is a very big deal. The biggest deal. As long as you are not a specialist on climate science yourself, all you can do is trust. That is true for all scientific endeavors. We pick people we trust and more or less believe in their stance on things.

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#225

Post by adventskalender »

svara wrote: post #201
adventskalender wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"OR you can note that 95%+ (and probably well higher than that) of climate scientists recognize that human cause climate science is fact" You realize that those "x% of scientists agree" claims are yet again based on models that are sometimes questionable? I've looked into the 97% claim (I think by "Cook"), which is based on manual estimates of summaries of papers. One problem is, how are the papers selected. Another…

The "X% of scientists agree" point is of course not a scientific argument, and I understand how it could be taken the wrong way, either as an appeal to authority or as a cheap regurgitation of canned talking points. But go ahead and read the full discussion here. I think a lack of patience with the dishonest discussion tactics used by poorly informed people arguing against the scientific state of the art is totally u…

"Yet as soon as you dig, the "scientific arguments" evaporate. For a beautiful example of this, see the comment I just wrote at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21820189 . "

The opposing side has just the same experience with the arguments and papers from your side - there are many articles and papers questioning and criticizing papers from the doomsday side. You are just cherry picking and practicing confirmation bias (see, another paper refuted, so my side must be right). In fact the "95% of scientists agree" is just such an example - if you look into it, the number becomes very questionable. And once people see one of your arguments is shoddy, why should they give your other arguments the benefit of the doubt?

And your answer, as well as the comment you were replying to: it might as well all just be gibberish, for someone who isn't a climate scientist.

And in the end your refutation boils down to "we know that CO2 traps heat and warms the earth" - which is presumably true, but people don't seem to agree on the extent of it. And other factors seem to affect it, too.

Why do you even believe the "CO2 traps heat" thing? I tend to believe it, too. But that is because I was taught it does back in high school, 35 years ago. Maybe it actually was bullshit already back then, but as a teenager, I didn't know that what teachers said could be questioned.

I don't think any of us has done an actual experiment trapping heat with CO2...

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#226

Post by WA »

adventskalender wrote: post #225
svara wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "X% of scientists agree" point is of course not a scientific argument, and I understand how it could be taken the wrong way, either as an appeal to authority or as a cheap regurgitation of canned talking points. But go ahead and read the full discussion here. I think a lack of patience with the dishonest discussion tactics used by poorly informed people arguing against the scientific state of the art is totally u…

"Yet as soon as you dig, the "scientific arguments" evaporate. For a beautiful example of this, see the comment I just wrote at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21820189 . " The opposing side has just the same experience with the arguments and papers from your side - there are many articles and papers questioning and criticizing papers from the doomsday side. You are just cherry picking and practicing confirmatio…

> there are many articles and papers questioning and criticizing papers from the doomsday side

Name a few please.

> Why do you even believe the "CO2 traps heat" thing?

Same reason why we believe radiation is bad for people. Nobody of us has done any actual experiments on splitting atoms. But some people do. They published the results. They can be verified and reproduced. It's called science.

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#227

Post by WA »

mistermann wrote: post #206
svara wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are saying a lot of different, seemingly subtle things, while heavily hedging everything, which makes it super hard to have a meaningful discussion. I am honestly not entirely sure what you are trying to say with things like > Agreed, but this does not logically preclude my concerns that it is possible that [...] I mean, if you're talking philosophy here, I obviously agree that this is a logical possibility , but…

> You are saying a lot of different, seemingly subtle things, while heavily hedging everything, which makes it super hard to have a meaningful discussion. "While heavily hedging everything", I suspect, is my unusual writing style, where I explicitly qualify that which is speculative, as being speculative, as opposed to the more common practice of presenting estimates and speculation as cold hard facts. It's a bit con…

> What if you're wrong?

This is the right question and there is an easy answer: If all climate models are wrong, it still makes sense to reduce emissions, waste, garbage, cruelty to animals etc. Worst case would be that we "wasted" money on stuff that makes no difference to the climate.

But did you answer the question from the other side? What if you're wrong and there IS man-made climate change? Well, then we simply can't afford to burn more fossil fuels etc.

Edit: Just watched your video. Yeah, human psychology. But how do you solve this if one part of humans think that the only thing that's left is a "giant middle finger to the system"?

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#228

Post by svara »

adventskalender wrote: post #225
svara wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "X% of scientists agree" point is of course not a scientific argument, and I understand how it could be taken the wrong way, either as an appeal to authority or as a cheap regurgitation of canned talking points. But go ahead and read the full discussion here. I think a lack of patience with the dishonest discussion tactics used by poorly informed people arguing against the scientific state of the art is totally u…

"Yet as soon as you dig, the "scientific arguments" evaporate. For a beautiful example of this, see the comment I just wrote at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21820189 . " The opposing side has just the same experience with the arguments and papers from your side - there are many articles and papers questioning and criticizing papers from the doomsday side. You are just cherry picking and practicing confirmatio…

> The opposing side has just the same experience with the arguments and papers from your side - there are many articles and papers questioning and criticizing papers from the doomsday side. You are just cherry picking and practicing confirmation bias

I was doing the literal opposite of cherry-picking, I was digging into the arguments as they were presented to me. So far nothing has held up. If you can give me an argument with a proper source I'll happily look into that as well.

> In fact the "95% of scientists agree" is just such an example - if you look into it, the number becomes very questionable.

A very poor example on many levels. 1) This statement is fundamentally irrelevant to the (scientific) discussion, because it does not contain a scientific argument. It could be 0%, it could be a 100%, that wouldn't change the validity of any of the scientific arguments presented. Truth isn't measured in mass appeal. 2) Yet, for someone who isn't well informed about a field, putting some trust in the subject matter experts is an OK strategy, and the point that a consensus broadly exists in climate science is correct, and there is support for the precise number of 97%. [0]

> And your answer, as well as the comment you were replying to: it might as well all just be gibberish, for someone who isn't a climate scientist.

High energy particle physics is mostly gibberish to me, yet I don't go around lecturing people on how it's all wrong.

But your point is also wrong: I am not a climate scientist, and the whole discussion can be followed with a bit of high school physics, chemistry and biology, plus Wikipedia to fill in the gaps. Your next point shows that you were unwilling to put in that effort, but it isn't actually that hard ...

> And in the end your refutation boils down to "we know that CO2 traps heat and warms the earth"

It absolutely does not, I was addressing a very specific point about how historic CO2 levels are measured.

> Why do you even believe the "CO2 traps heat" thing?

Because you too can do things like look up the absorption spectrum for CO2 [1] or even do an experiment like [2] yourself.

[0] https://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_effect#/media/File:...

[2] https://aapt.scitation.org/doi/10.1119/1.1987255

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#229

Post by linuxftw »

imtringued wrote: post #212
linuxftw wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not me questioning physics. CO2 levels lagged historic temperature increases. It's up to the CO2-causes-warming people to explain it.

I don't get it. Climate change critics try to find one flaw in some straw man argument and then denounce the whole field as a lie. CO2 isn't the only thing that causes warming and no, scientists are not stupid enough to not account for these things. I mean this statement is trivial to disprove because methane and tons of other things also act as greenhouse gases or amplify heating. It doesn't change the threat caused…

It's one flaw of many. First, nobody really trusts the temperature data. Second, the earth was much hotter before. Third, there was an ice age, now there isn't, planet was already warming. Fourth, water vapor is recognized as the most powerful greenhouse gas. Fifth, we don't believe solar energy is being adequately accounted for.

We have a what we consider a lot of holes, big import holes, in the theory. These issues are immediately dismissed. The fact that people can say with a straight face that water vapor increases global warming, yet is not the primary cause, even though it's the strongest greenhouse gas, is beyond believe. It defies comprehension, I will never, ever take the CO2 theory serious, and I'll be here encouraging others to think for themselves as well.

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#230

Post by adventskalender »

WA wrote: post #226
adventskalender wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Yet as soon as you dig, the "scientific arguments" evaporate. For a beautiful example of this, see the comment I just wrote at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21820189 . " The opposing side has just the same experience with the arguments and papers from your side - there are many articles and papers questioning and criticizing papers from the doomsday side. You are just cherry picking and practicing confirmatio…

> there are many articles and papers questioning and criticizing papers from the doomsday side Name a few please. > Why do you even believe the "CO2 traps heat" thing? Same reason why we believe radiation is bad for people. Nobody of us has done any actual experiments on splitting atoms. But some people do. They published the results. They can be verified and reproduced. It's called science.

"Name a few please."

I already mentioned the Cook paper that gave us the "97% consensus" number.

(Edit: for completeness sake, here is an article debunking the number. I haven't read it and don't know if it has any merit, it is just the first Google result. https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2014/02/debunking_the_9... - the point stands, though, that you can find articles refuting pretty much anything you want, these days).

Other than that, I didn't keep track, and I only encounter such discussions randomly every now and then.

I would wager a guess, that you could find a counter reaction for most important climate science papers. Just google for them.

"But some people do. They published the results. They can be verified and reproduced. It's called science. "

In principle, yes, but your idea of science is highly idealized. In reality, most things are not as established and as verified as you believe them to be. Politics, egos, all sorts of things play a part. If you look back in history, there are many cases where people believed wrong things until their main representatives died, for example.

Also one problem with climate science is presumably that you can not simply do experiments to verify its claims. That might a huge part of the problem.

Again it mostly boils down to trust - trusting the scientists who do the verifying, trusting the institutions who employ and endorse the scientists.

What you and climate doomsayers don't seem to understand is that a lot of people don't trust the institutions anymore. And rightfully so.

I suspect a lot of the rage is actually about this: people who can't stand the thought that the institutions they trust can't be trusted, so fighting any challenges to their world view with tooth and nails.

And people who feel betrayed by the institutions they used to trust.

That doesn't mean all science is false. But it makes it harder to find the truth.

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