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What's Really Warming the World?

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Re: What's Really Warming the World?

#391

Post by 300bps »

themgt wrote: post #346

Helpful when reading this thread to keep in mind Michael Mann's six stages of climate change denial: 1. CO2 is not actually increasing. 2. Even if it is, the increase has no impact on the climate since there is no convincing evidence of warming. 3. Even if there is warming, it is due to natural causes. 4. Even if the warming cannot be explained by natural causes, the human impact is small, and the impact of continued…

I don't think the general population is thinking about it that much. To me, the main denial seems to be a dislike and/or distrust of the people advocating the AGW theory.

For example, having Al Gore as a prominent figure of the AGW theory movement for a number of years is enough to make them suspicious. They see him fly in private jets, own multiple humongous homes, make investments that will pay off if things like carbon credits become mainstream, release a movie 9 months after Katrina that promised more and more severe hurricanes that never materialized, etc, etc. He might not be a duck but he sure seems to quack a lot.

The other main denial seems to be things like, "It's cold today - in your face global warming".

I think Michael Mann is giving people far too much credit.

Re: What's Really Warming the World?

#392

Post by sgt101 »

jwp729 wrote: post #363
sgt101 wrote: post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well - that's true apart from co-incidence. You can have a very simple theory which says "x is directly caused by y" and there is a lot of good data, and a great fit. But it's kist a co-incidence and breaks down immediately. Occam's razor is a rule of thumb and an aesthetic boon, but nothing more. The real test is that you have a theory that is meaningful and has explanatory power. If it grants insight on the mechani…

I think the information theoretic approach to modeling concerns actually implies such "simpler is better" approaches as Occam's Razor. At least that's my take on [ http://arxiv.org/abs/cond-mat/9601030 ], which derives a quantitative form of it.

I haven't read that paper, and the abstract makes my head spin! I'll have a look later, and try and figure out the argument. I agree with you that things like the I-measure are based on the idea that simpler is good, and it works well in practice - both in Machine Learning and in the real world - which is why humans tend to prefer it. But (the paper you cite aside) I don't know of a deep reason why simple is preferred by nature.

Also there is a deep cognitive bias here, perhaps we lack the machinery to understand the world as it really is!

Re: What's Really Warming the World?

#393

Post by thaumaturgy »

marcus_holmes wrote: post #246
cholantesh wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't call a paper whose lead author is a well-established denier with no scientific training ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Monckton,_3rd_Visc... ), and which is co-authored by a known practitioner of large-scale scientific fraud for pay ( http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Willie_Soon ) particularly reputable.

ad-hominem. Who cares who wrote it, what does it say?

Ad hominem fallacy fallacy: http://laurencetennant.com/bonds/adhominem.html

Pointing out that someone is not trustworthy when considering whether or not to trust their conclusions is not ad-hom.

Re: What's Really Warming the World?

#394

Post by Uhhrrr »

npsimons wrote: post #378
talmand wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a serious problem in multiple areas in society these days; the inability to ask simple questions that may go against the "accepted" narrative without being personally attacked. Science, religion, politics, sports, it's everywhere. It's a seriously sad state of affairs, but nothing new really, if you think about it. The reach of modern communications has inflated the problem in my opinion.

Here's the thing: honest enquiry is something that should be encouraged. Sea-lioning[1], JAQing off[2] and Gish gallops[3] should not. When you are buried to your eyeballs in bullshit, it's hard to see who is really someone willing learn, and who is just shoveling on more. [1] - http://simplikation.com/why-sealioning-is-bad/ [2] - http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Just_asking_questions [3] - http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/G…

The problems are

1) You can't tell whether someone is "just asking questions" in good faith or not.

2) Dismissing a horde of people all raising the same problems with one's beliefs as "sealions" is a tempting shortcut to actually examining one's beliefs, which might in fact be wrong.

Re: What's Really Warming the World?

#395

Post by bildung »

tosseraccount wrote: post #348
tosseraccount wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious. Gravity has not been proven to attract two masses, for instance?

Is there any evidence that two masses don't attract ?

> Is there any evidence that two masses don't attract ?

The answer to that question does not in any way proof the existence of gravity.

I don't mean to offend, but if you honestly ask these types of questions, I doubt you are able to evaluate the quality of original papers dealing with climate research.

Re: What's Really Warming the World?

#396

Post by pc2g4d »

IvyMike wrote: post #358
rza wrote: post #342

This graphic really just plays into the hands of climate change deniers. No labelled axis, a timeline of only 100 years (you could also argue the dinosaurs caused global warming), and the quite proud declaration at the end the argument is really "no contest" under the assumption that correlation == causation. I could also make a graph that shows the increase in global temperature correlating with the rise in the Lati…

> under the assumption that correlation == causation Except we do have a pretty good understanding of the chemisty/physics of the greenhouse effect, too. So there's a prediction ("increased CO2 will lead to warming") and a validation. What more do they want?

It's just that the presentation overreached. They should at least mention the other inputs to a comprehensive model that were tried but just didn't have a big impact, otherwise it feels like they just decided in advance that CO2 was the answer.

Re: What's Really Warming the World?

#397

Post by loganu »

Zuider wrote: post #390
loganu wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's become a politicized issue, and as such, the media has created a narrative of 2 sides and a "debate." Take the 97% and put it into a different context and it makes the situation seem absolutely ludicrous. If you had a sore stomach, and asked 2 groups of people to help you figure out why, would you trust the diagnosis from a group with 100 world-class doctors, surgeons, dieticians, etc... or 100 random people? Wh…

>If you had a sore stomach, and asked 2 groups of people to help you figure out why, would you trust the diagnosis from a group with 100 world-class doctors, surgeons, dieticians, etc... or 100 random people? Not unless two of those 100 random individuals were Barry Marshall and Robin Warren and the stomach pain was due to a peptic ulcer. https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Barry_Marshall "Marshall and Robin Warren showe…

I get what you're saying, but Marshall was a doctor. He'd be in the 3% of the group of informed scientists that are working to figure out this scenario. My point is that the general public's opinion and perception of the issue shouldn't carry as much weight as the experts.

Re: What's Really Warming the World?

#398

Post by mikeash »

tunesmith wrote: post #321
moubarak wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a non-secular person that's why. I certainly don't have the numbers, i read them here and there. But i base it on knowledge coming from scriptures. Scientists are hardworking people, but i don't take their numbers as faith.

There's a difference between religion and willful ignorance. If you want to believe or disbelieve something unprovable, fine - that can be defined as religion, or conjecture in science-speak. But to believe or disbelieve something in the face of observation, clear evidence, and fact - that is not religion.

Why is that not religion? Certainly there are religions that fit themselves entirely within the "believe something unprovable" niche, but there are a lot of religions that go much farther than that.

Re: What's Really Warming the World?

#399

Post by reitanqild »

TillE wrote: post #355
themgt wrote: post #346

Helpful when reading this thread to keep in mind Michael Mann's six stages of climate change denial: 1. CO2 is not actually increasing. 2. Even if it is, the increase has no impact on the climate since there is no convincing evidence of warming. 3. Even if there is warming, it is due to natural causes. 4. Even if the warming cannot be explained by natural causes, the human impact is small, and the impact of continued…

The first four stages have always baffled me. Anyone who knows basic chemistry understands how carbon dioxide interacts with infrared radiation. Combine that with the fact that human activity is releasing tens of billions of tons of CO2 every year, which does not magically disappear. In fact, it's quite measurable. The climate is complex, but the basic facts of the situation are incredibly simple and unavoidable. And…

> Anyone who knows basic chemistry understands how carbon dioxide interacts with infrared radiation.

I'd say this does not exactly fall under basic chemistry.

When arguing serious matters, choose your words wisely.

Re: What's Really Warming the World?

#400

Post by astrodust »

tosseraccount wrote: post #381
gnaritas wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You aren't capable of interpreting it, as is no one individual which is rather the point you're missing.

I'm not sure I understand. Can you explain? Are you saying people can not understand this data?

You know, why don't you help us out and wget some data from CERN and give them some insight into their ongoing LHC experiments.

I'm sure they could use a nudge in the right direction, and I bet a little bit of Perl or Python is all they need to solve some deep mysteries.

Oh, and you have 6,000TB of disk space to download the data from the ATLAS sensor, right?

Once you're done that there's all kinds of data regarding cancer treatments you can crunch through. I bet that's a weekend of work at the outside.

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