Browser-based climate change simulation • Hacker News Board

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#231

Post by adventskalender » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 1:47 PM UTC

svara wrote: post #228

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…

> 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 argu…

"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."

Again, that is exactly how your opponents feel.

" there is support for the precise number of 97%. [0]"

You are merely appealing to authority. I already told you why I think the number is questionable, yet you keep at it. All your reference tells me is that the NASA is not an honest player in the debate and can't be trusted. Since I already looked into the papers that produced the consensus numbers, yet NASA chooses to use the numbers anyway. Since I have to assume NASA has the capacity to understand those papers, I have to assume they choose to selectively quote them out of political motivation. So they don't count as honest scientists anymore. (Honest Scientist = people who are dedicated to finding the truth, not just in validating their beliefs).

And it very much contains a scientific argument, by proxy - since we can only trust the scientists, not verify their claims, if you claim the scientists support your arguments, you are making the claim that your arguments are backed by science. It is very relevant.

It may also be one of the most cited claims in the whole debate.

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

But you also don't go around and educate people on particle physics. There are no stakes for most of us (unless you count the cost in tax payer money for building particle accelerators). Not the same with CO2.

"> 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."

Yes you did, all you said is "we know how CO2 works", "we know" was your entire argument:

"Importantly, of course, none of this is really that relevant to the discussion of anthropogenic global warming, since we know that we are putting CO2 into the atmosphere, and that CO2 in the atmosphere traps heat."

"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"

Oh so you claim the authority of a climate scientist now, because it is oh such a simple subject? You took some high school physics, Wikipedia, and now you are an expert on climate?

I don't think anybody doubts that CO2 can trap heat in principle. But going from that to a doomsday scenario is a little bit more complex.

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#232

Post by Matumio » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 1:54 PM UTC

EdSharkey wrote: post #168

Matumio wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Solar activity may be rising (but I think it's falling actually?), and yes has had an impact in the past, and yes we don't know how large exactly. Does this mean we cannot make any valid predictions until we know it to the last digit? This of course depends on how large the uncertainty of its effect is, compared to other effects. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_activity_and_climate

You cite a lot of uncertainty about Solar activity! Sure, you can use models to make predictions for a date in the future. Then, you wait to see if you reach that date and the predictions come true. Then you can make qualitative assertions about the accuracy of the model, its shortcomings, and whatnot. Do we have evidence of past climate models making accurate future predictions? (I really don’t know, now you have me…

Surely we have historical data to validate models with?! I'm no expert, but this all sounds very plausible to me. Some parts are even basic physics, like reflection and black-body radiation, which I'm pretty sure we have nailed down exactly by now. Other parts are uncertain: simplifications of topology, chaotic processes, methane content of melting grounds, etc.

The model allows to answer "what-if" questions, and the uncertainty of the answer also depends on the question. Would the temperature rise if earth's atmosphere suddenly had the composition on Venus? Hell yes, we can predict that with high confidence, without ever trying it for real. Can we predict the gusts of wind caused by this, the global heat distribution, the exact timing? Probably not, at least it's not plausible to me that we could model every effect that matters for such a detailed prediction.

But does it sound so unbelievable that we have a model accurate enough to predict the rough effect of additional CO2 on global temperature? Or would you argue that it is more plausible that most scientists are corrupt and follow someone's agenda, and have discarded the idea of doing honest science which they must have had when starting?

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#233

Post by svara » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 1:54 PM UTC

adventskalender wrote: post #231

svara wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 argu…

"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." Again, that is exactly how your opponents feel. " there is support for the precise number of 97%. [0]" You are merely appealing to authority. I already told you why I think the number is…

This comment is so intellectually dishonest that I have to conclude that you're trolling. I don't want to continue polluting this comments section with a detailed response.

If you are genuinely interested in discussing this, I'm leaving my e-mail in my profile for a while.

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#234

Post by adventskalender » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 2:09 PM UTC

svara wrote: post #233

adventskalender wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"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." Again, that is exactly how your opponents feel. " there is support for the precise number of 97%. [0]" You are merely appealing to authority. I already told you why I think the number is…

This comment is so intellectually dishonest that I have to conclude that you're trolling. I don't want to continue polluting this comments section with a detailed response. If you are genuinely interested in discussing this, I'm leaving my e-mail in my profile for a while.

"intellectually dishonest" - seriously, what the fuck?

You give no reason why you think so, and I don't see why I should have to disprove your belief.

(edit: presumably you refer to the lines where I say you claim to be an expert on climate science now? Maybe the rhetoric was a bit harsh. But that was only a part of the whole comment. And I stand by the point, that nobody can claim to be an expert just by reading some Wikipedia and highschool books. The issue is that most arguments boil down to appeals to authority.)

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#235

Post by kaybe » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 2:14 PM UTC

allovernow wrote: post #175

svara wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're probably confused by the fact that (1) they are plotting ice core based CO2 concentrations as years before 1950 and (2) the time resolution of the ancient ice core data is quite low, while all the anthropogenic action happened in the last 150 y or so (and about 50% of the CO2 addition happened in the last 50). Look at [0] for a more authoritative source and specifically compare the 800 and 400 ky data to the 2…

What I'm saying is that all of our historic CO2 data comes from cores, which are a proxy for paleo-CO2 levels. The theory is that bubbles of atmospheric gas are trapped in ice as it forms over thousands of years. What I'm saying is that there's the possibility that this trapping is imperfect, and ratios of atmospheric gassed may change after being sequestered, such that past ppm values are underestimated, and the cur…

> What I'm saying is that there's the possibility that this trapping is imperfect, and ratios of atmospheric gassed may change after being sequestered..

Do you seriously think that we don't consider these things? Seriously?

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#236

Post by moosey » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 2:52 PM UTC

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…

Pointing out that 95% (or more) climate scientists say that climate change is happening is not appeal to authority, but appeal to expertise. The former is a logical fallacy. The latter is not.

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#237

Post by plytheman » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 2:53 PM UTC

mistermann wrote: post #87

plytheman wrote: post #32

About 5 or 6 years ago towards the end of my undergrad my professor picked up on this and we held some mock UN Climate assemblies using this tool.[1] The class divided up into first world, developing, and poorer nations and each had to bring their needs to the table while trying to compromise. I got to actually lead a session at MIT for some incoming freshman which was fun. The dashboard is super handy to drive home…

> The class divided up into first world, developing, and poorer nations and each had to bring their needs to the table while trying to compromise. Modeling the debate on the dimension of national wealth seems like a good idea. I'm curious, was there any discussion about potential value in modeling on other dimensions, such as political affiliation?

Not that I know of. We were just running off the materials En-Roads provided. From what I remember, though, each bloc is given cues as to what industries and population they represent which then plays into their arguments. So it isn't outright said that someone should argue a conservative or liberal angle, but knowing you need to defend your nation's industrial production or vulnerable communities lends itself towards some political talking points on one side or the other.

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#238

Post by WA » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 2:54 PM UTC

adventskalender wrote: post #230

WA wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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, the…

Yes, part of it boils down to trust. Another part of it boils down to common sense. You could argue that common sense is: "Human behavior too insignificant to have any impact". Or you could argue that common sense is: "If you take too many shits in your environment, they'll come and bite you back sooner or later." I actually think the latter is more reasonable. It's quite tangible.

Do you even realize how exchangeable your last 4 paragraphs are? See:

What you and climate change deniers 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 [that they are actually responsible for pollution] with tooth and nails.

And people who feel betrayed by the institutions they used to trust [so they pick obscure papers, obscure individuals and claim that they are right and climate change is not a real thing, or at least not caused by humans].

> But it makes it harder to find the truth.

For sure, but as an individual, you don't need to find the absolute truth. There is a very simple idea in protecting the environment: If you try to be resourceful and protect your environment, it probably has more benefits than exploiting the environment and polluting it. It simply doesn't matter whether climate science is right or not. Reducing pollution is always something worth fighting for, no matter if it has any effects on the global climate.

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#239

Post by 345218435 » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 2:55 PM UTC

madacol wrote: post #174

345218435 wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

guess what. all other climate changes in earth‘s history happened w/o humans. plants need at least 150ppm co2. they flourish with more. we‘re pumping co2 into green houses to make shit grow. we are at around 400ppm and had 1200ppm in the past, no problem. now these folks run around headless wanting to lower it further. complete mindlessness. global average temperature is a joke. the earth‘s climate consists of many,…

https://xkcd.com/1732/

xkcd. what a great and representative resource... for the sheepish alarmist hn crowd.

it‘s the same hockey stick bull crap that gore used to make you cry.

all the models normalize the raw data into oblivion and all the models are not properly adjusted to preindustrialization fluctuation of the climate. also, the models being used have been developed to understand current data and co2-influences — not to extrapulate predictions.

Re: Browser-based climate change simulation

#240

Post by adultSwim » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 3:21 PM UTC

11235813213455 wrote: post #135

rwc wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There comes a point where the model no longer accepts any progress beyond a +1.0C increase. No matter how many additional actions taken, the floor is +1.0C. It seems the immediate extinction of the human race would still result in an increase in temperature. Is there research that backs this up?

There is research that found the massive local population extinction after America conquest was linked to the planet cooling in that period, so I'm quite sure reducing human population either literally (by limiting growth) or virtually (by reducing consumerism/consumption, which is the key for limiting pollution) or both! will help a lot https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-47063973

Genociding multiple continents isn't exactly a model I want to follow. "Population control" will continue to be Nazi-speak as long as it applies primarily to post-colonial countries, which while having high birth rates, also contributed minimally to CO2 emissions.