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Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

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Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#381
post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As the Ars article makes it clear, the predicted range of temperature change was extremely wide, 0.35 to 0.7 degrees by now even if you allow for the re-scaling to a shorter time period, yet actual change was at the very lowest point of that uncertainty interval. That by itself doesn't tell us that they understand the climate though. Remember that previously they were extrapolating a cooling trend into an ice age. An…

It’s not news that scientific consensus becomes more precise over time. The point was simply that scientists have a good track record of making accurate predictions decades out, which is quite the contrast of how deniers have flitted from wrong prediction to wrong prediction. Don’t feel bad for them, however — they get paid a lot better than climate scientists do and are probably old enough to miss out on the worst o…

It got less precise. Look at the range of ECS estimates. They are now wider than they ever were. It's quite the controversy. Even guys like Hausfather and Schmidt are sounding the red alert over it.

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#382
post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But you agree that all the judgment also recognize that the jury would've edit: been able to recognize the comments as defamatory, and that, factually, in reality, the cases were - black on white - dissmissed on technicalities instead of from an actual judgment of anything scientific? The whole point is that you bringing this up has nothing to do with the subject of this conversation. And that you were blatantly wron…

No, the jury would not have found it defamatory if it were true, which it was. The cases were dismissed without evaluating the science because of Mann's behavior. The people he sued wanted to just get on with it and debate the science, but Mann literally filed suit and then never turned up to his own legal proceedings. Hence the judge's displeasure. Apparently Mann tried to make the same argument you made about not l…

You can chat with a lawyer for clarification

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#383
post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Technicalities" like Mann filing a lawsuit and then never actually doing anything to move it forward? The judge is extremely harsh towards Mann in the Mann v Ball case dismissal, stating in plain language that Mann has engaged in abusive behavior. He also clearly tried to BS the court about the reasons for delay. That sort of behavior is consistent with abusing the legal system so he could say he was suing for defam…

But you agree that all the judgment also recognize that the jury would've edit: been able to recognize the comments as defamatory, and that, factually, in reality, the cases were - black on white - dissmissed on technicalities instead of from an actual judgment of anything scientific? The whole point is that you bringing this up has nothing to do with the subject of this conversation. And that you were blatantly wron…

> But you agree that all the judgment also recognize that the jury would’ve recognized the comments as defamatory

The Mann v. Ball judgement [0] does no such thing (as is common for a procedural dismissal of this kind, it doesn’t address the merits at all.) I’m not going to track down the rest when the first one I check shows that you are wrong on the blanket claim, but if you’d like to point to any specific judgement that meets your description, feel free.

[0] http://climatecasechart.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/16/non-...

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#384
post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's backwards! Michael Mann filed a defamation lawsuit against a skeptic and then lost it nine years later. The court awarded the defendant full costs: https://climatechangedispatch.com/tim-ball-defeats-michael-m... Not only did the B.C. Supreme Court grant Ball’s application for dismissal of the nine-year, multi-million dollar lawsuit, it also took the additional step of awarding full legal costs to Ball. The cas…

Mann v competitive enterprise institute recognizes that a jury would find their comments as deragatory, false and damaging, and the suit was dropped because Mann delayed the proceedings as he was "busy with other things". No where was his data found fraudulent - the court recognized that Mr.Ball's statements are derogatory. The delay is a technicality that has nothing to do with science. The article you linked is ver…

> Mann v competitive enterprise institute recognizes that a jury would find their comments as deragatory, false and damaging

No, Mann v. Competitive Enterprise Institute had Mann’s claims against CEI dismissed at summary judgement because Mann’s evidence was insufficient for any reasonable jury to conclude that the required standard (“actual malice”) was met in CEI’s conduct, irrespectice of whether the charges were false or not. [0] (“actual malice” was held to be a triable issue of fact for the jury against an individual defendant in the same case, as was the actual falsity of the charges. I believe the case against the individual defendant was abandoned because CEI was the real target, or just because of Mann’s pattern of abandoning cases because he was “too busy” to prosecute them after filing.)

I wonder if in general you are making the mistake of assuming that motions to dismiss or for summary judgement in which the court is required to assume that the jury would find for Mann in any cases where there is a material issue of fact constitute “recognition” that the jury would find for Mann, which is decidedly not the case.

[0] http://climatecasechart.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/16/case...

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "Cattle Inventory: United States" chart here claims there are 95 million, down from a peak of 130 million in 1970s. https://cairncrestfarm.com/blog/how-many-cows-are-there-in-t...

I guess it depends how you count them: > Other key findings in the report were: Of the 89.3 million head inventory, all cows and heifers that have calved totaled 38.3 million. There are 28.9 million beef cows in the United States as of Jan. 1, 2023, down 4% from last year. The number of milk cows in the United States increased to 9.40 million. U.S. calf crop was estimated at 34.5 million head, down 2% from 2021. All…

If you read the actual report that is linked from there, you will find from the table on page 4 that the classes of cattle not listed in the press releases are heifers, steers, bulls, and calves, and that they do sum to ~89 million.

https://downloads.usda.library.cornell.edu/usda-esmis/files/...

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#386
post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Per the IPCC’s AR5, the GWP20 (“Global Warming Potential, i.e. relative radiative forcing over 20 years) of methane is about 80X that of CO2, while the GWP100 is 26-32, or about 28X. I have a paper I’m (very slowly) working that argues that these figures may be too low. Our current model of CH4 emissions and natural destruction assume a lifetime of 9-10 years in the atmosphere. The problem is if you do some simple st…

The calculus on this is going to be hard because methane can’t absorb photons that have already been absorbed by the atmosphere around it. It’s a bit like calculating if I’ll die of cancer. If you could protect me from everything you might be able to know that I’d die of colon cancer at 75. But here I am breathing weird dust and walking a route that starts on city streets and driving X miles a year and you just don’t…

The geophysicists and others who model this are aware of these issues.

The question I am investigating is an input to such calculations; I am not qualified to estimate the impact.

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#387
post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But you agree that all the judgment also recognize that the jury would've edit: been able to recognize the comments as defamatory, and that, factually, in reality, the cases were - black on white - dissmissed on technicalities instead of from an actual judgment of anything scientific? The whole point is that you bringing this up has nothing to do with the subject of this conversation. And that you were blatantly wron…

> But you agree that all the judgment also recognize that the jury would’ve recognized the comments as defamatory The Mann v. Ball judgement [0] does no such thing (as is common for a procedural dismissal of this kind, it doesn’t address the merits at all.) I’m not going to track down the rest when the first one I check shows that you are wrong on the blanket claim, but if you’d like to point to any specific judgemen…

I'm unable to copy paste somehow, I'm very sorry. http://climatecasechart.com/case/mann-v-competitive-enterpri...

Edit: here it is When looking at the bottom of the climate change litigation database on Mann v Competitive enterprise, if you go read the second to last summary, it states what I was meaning to say. I think I read it a bit quickly - it states that Mann met the burden of proving that a jury could find actual malice...etc. The to me is enough to indicate that the courts were supporting the suits as having some degree of validity. I think I was a little heavy worded in my prior comment.

What I meant to say was that all courts recognized some degree of validity to his claims of derogatory comments, by not dismissing his suits on those grounds, but on technicalities. So the whole thing is simply inconclusive, while the other commenter keeps arguing that it proves Mann is the antichrist.

So this whole tangent feels unnecessary and goal-post moving, as it has nothing to do with science.

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#388

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Methane naturally turns into CO2 in the atmosphere After how long? A half-life of a decade , as I understand it? Not exactly the order of magnitude of luxury time we have to spare. > Even if it did increase warming more than CO2 "Even if it did" is strange wording for an established fact. Do you write "even if the sky was blue"? > once methane emissions reach a steady level, reducing methane emissions won't change…

> It's kind of really, really important how high that "steady level" is and how fast we'd reach it though, no? (Update: In hindsight I'm not sure you were talking about methane emissions in general or about methane from meat production. Here, I'm focussing on the latter. Meanwhile, fossil methane is of course a huge problem.) As for the second part of your question: When it comes to meat production, we have already r…

> When it comes to meat production, we have already reached the steady state.

Well yes but also no, we've reached a steady state. If we reduce meat production we would reach a new, lower steady state which would buy some more time.

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#389
post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not news that scientific consensus becomes more precise over time. The point was simply that scientists have a good track record of making accurate predictions decades out, which is quite the contrast of how deniers have flitted from wrong prediction to wrong prediction. Don’t feel bad for them, however — they get paid a lot better than climate scientists do and are probably old enough to miss out on the worst o…

It got less precise. Look at the range of ECS estimates. They are now wider than they ever were. It's quite the controversy. Even guys like Hausfather and Schmidt are sounding the red alert over it.

Do you have any examples you could point to? Most of their public comments on the topic of this thread look like this, noting the accuracy of predictions:

https://twitter.com/hausfath/status/1597660277188677632

https://www.science.org/content/article/even-50-year-old-cli...

Based on what little details you gave, I’m assuming you’re referring to the “hot models” paper:

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-01192-2

If so, the key point is that neither the IPCC nor NASA GISS reports are affected because they weight the models based on their accuracy predicting the past. This looks like the normal scientific process at work: ¼ of models are overly sensitive to CO2, careful validation caught it, and the major reports don’t have that problem because that review process worked. We also know that this is an increasing challenge human efforts do have a significant impact and if emissions go down that’ll be used by critics as proof that earlier predictions were wrong.

From a policy perspective, it’s also worth noting that there’s no credible reason to think warming will halt or reverse. At this point we have roughly half a century of models accurately predicting that we will have a big problem unless we stop polluting and we know the costs of the unavoidable warming are already measured in trillions. Trying to reduce error bars is always good but at this point it’s clear that acting seriously now will save many lives and enormous sums of money compared to letting the fossil fuel companies continue to encourage more rounds of “debate” on whether the problem is real.

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#390
post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But you agree that all the judgment also recognize that the jury would’ve recognized the comments as defamatory The Mann v. Ball judgement [0] does no such thing (as is common for a procedural dismissal of this kind, it doesn’t address the merits at all.) I’m not going to track down the rest when the first one I check shows that you are wrong on the blanket claim, but if you’d like to point to any specific judgemen…

I'm unable to copy paste somehow, I'm very sorry. http://climatecasechart.com/case/mann-v-competitive-enterpri... Edit: here it is When looking at the bottom of the climate change litigation database on Mann v Competitive enterprise, if you go read the second to last summary, it states what I was meaning to say. I think I read it a bit quickly - it states that Mann met the burden of proving that a jury could find act…

> if you go read the second to last summary, it states what I was meaning to say. I think I read it a bit quickly - it states that Mann met the burden of proving that a jury could find actual malice…etc. The to me is enough to indicate that the courts were supporting the suits as having some degree of validity. I think I was a little heavy worded in my prior comment.

Assuming you mean the third to last document in the reverse chronological listing (the second to last is the plaintiff’s amended complaint, not a finding of the court), this is a ruling on a very early motion to dismiss, and what it actually found is that it was too early to determine whether or not there was, as a matter of law, sufficient evidence for a jury to find “actual malice” to the required standard of proof. [0] The first (most recent) document in that list (the one I linked upthread) is on a later motion for summary judgement, and, on the same issue, the court found explicitly against Mann on “actual malice” from CEI, finding that there was not evidence on which a reasonable jury could find that, which is why they dismissed his claim against CEI. That earlier ruling is not the court endorsing any degree of validity of any of Mann's claims, it is simply stating it is too early to address whether or not those claims were material disputes of fact for the jury, much less whether they had validity (which is mostly what the jury decides, though the court can resolve it when it reaches the level where there is no basis for a jury to find one way or the other.)

> What I meant to say was that all courts recognized some degree of validity to his claims of derogatory comments,

That’s simply false; some found that there would be triable issue of fact on falsity, but that’s not recognizing any merit of the claim, and others simply did not address the question at all.

> What I meant to say was that all courts recognized some degree of validity to his claims of derogatory comments, by not dismissing his suits on those grounds, but on technicalities.

Dismissing claims because of failure to provide sufficient evidence to meet required elements of the claim (like “actual malice” against CEI) is not a “technicality” (which is a bad name for procedural misconduct resulting in a dismissal with prejudice, anyway) but a ruling on the merits of the claim.

> So the whole thing is simply inconclusive, while the other commenter keeps arguing that it proves Mann is the antichrist.

I don’t see anyone claiming that Mann is the antichrist. He is a serial abuser of the legal systems of multiple jurisdictions, however, that is clear, and his claims on this issue have either been dismissed on the merits or because of his culpable failure to pursue them.

[0] “At this stage, the evidence before the Court does not amount to a showing of clear and convincing as to ‘actual malice,’ however there is sufficient evidence to find that further discovery may uncover evidence of ‘actual malice.’ It is therefore premature to make a determination as to whether the CEI Defendants did not act with ‘actual malice.’” http://climatecasechart.com/case/mann-v-competitive-enterpri...

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