etudiant

I'd thought that the primary objection was not denial of the current evidence, but rather claims that similar or warmer conditions were in effect in prior recorded history, for instance during the Norse settlements of Greenland.. That then translates into a claim that there is a natural warm cold cycle, which the current models fail to capture. The Norse settlement was not small, it was big enough to be allocated its own bishop and they were able to sustain cattle and sheep. Presumably there could be some isotope measurements possible in stalactites or glacier ice which provides some guidance on this issue, but I've not seen anything that really digs into the question.

I suspect we all underestimate the potential for reform. If people want change, they will get it. With effectively unlimited power from nuclear, even extreme efforts such as carbon capture are feasible. What is required is a broad recognition that there really is a problem. That has not been achieved, imho partly because the early AGW researchers desperately oversold the immediacy of their findings. The subsequent pause after 1998 put them into the 'boy who cried wolf' category and that has impeded any further consensus action. Sadly I believe it will now take a climate catastrophe to spur any concerted action. A collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet might force a recognition of the problem, but failing that, business as usual remains the most likely outcome. The best hope for progress is from the renewable energy sector. If it can continue to deliver increasingly economical power, we might buy some additional decades to find a solution to the problem.

That leaves it up to nature to balance the equation, which she is quite capable of doing, but I doubt we would like the process. It seems a counsel of despair, that we cannot manage ourselves, which also is quite wrong by the evidence of collapsing birth rates in Asia, Europe and the Americas. Only Africa still has rapid population growth, but that will adjust as the continent becomes more urbanized and civilized.

The discussion was about the difficulty of mobilizing the public to tackle climate change as an imminent danger. I was simply pointing out that the actions by the most powerful leaders in the debate undermine the narrative for the broader public.

An other problem imho is the dissonance between the rhetoric and the actions of the leading AGW politicians. The public sees that both Al Gore as well as Barack Obama bought large oceanfront estates shortly after leaving office. Presumably these well informed individuals would not buy such homes if they anticipated losing them shortly to rising seas. John Q Public takes comfort from this evidence that there is no imminent danger.

Always thought that this is a wild card that does not get enough attention. A premature frost would have massive global consequences, because the US corn crop is a third of the world total.

I don't think action is easily compelled, even less so when there is little leadership and few clear examples of the way forward. Germany is a case in point, vocally green and yet more dependent on coal and energy imports than before. If Japan could be mobilized, that would be a persuasive step, but there is no sign of such. Meanwhile, the evidence of a real ecosystems breakdown is all around us, evidenced by the recent report on declining bird numbers (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-science-birds-idUSKBN1W42NA) That is a disaster arising from habitat destruction, bad land use and indiscriminate use of pesticides, all problems that can be fixed, at a price. Who pays the price is the sticking point, even though long term we all share the hurt that is being inflicted.

Don't think this is a helpful cartoon. It is deeply anti scientific, an appeal to mass authority. In response to a book 'A hundred authors against relativity'. Einstein said: 'Why 100? If I were wrong, one would have been enough.' Einstein said 'Why 100? If I were wrong, one would have been enough.'

Not a regular here, but this really needs organization to provide help. I'm thinking of 10,000 or so households that have lost everything and that are remote from any helping entity. Is there a shuttle ferry or something similar (airport was under water afaik) to deliver basic supplies? All we can do here is to send money, but who is a trustworthy recipient? Do any of the regulars here know?

It would be so very helpful if the media presentation of this issue were better guided by the science. Instead we have a high school kid sailing to the UN to tell the world what to do. Not sure that is a good basis for policy.

Same in Central Park, massive acorns all over, going begging for lack of enough squirrels. Also very generous seed clusters and berries on the various trees and shrubs. The damp weather we had earlier has yielded a well above average harvest. Migrants will be well fed. Doubt however that it helps predict the winter.

Quite wrong imho. The big rise in emissions is from China, India and other developing countries desperate to lift their people out of millennia of poverty. They need reliable power for their industrial development and coal is the best way to achieve that. Nuclear is better, but costs too much because of the regulatory overhead imposed by anti proliferation and anti exposure rules.

Not persuaded, it postulates 2 unverified developments, first an accelerating sea level rise and second a pattern of intensifying TCs. Afaik, there is very little evidence for either at present. So this seems more a 'sky is falling' paper than an evidence based document.

That redundancy costs a lot of money. Overall, one pays for 2 complete power systems. That makes everyone so much poorer. I'd much rather see the money spent on low emission nuclear, because it is 24/7 available, so it folds seamlessly into the grid. The associated pollution issues are less imho than the massive problems generated by rare earth extraction for wind power generators or area coverage with solar collectors.

The challenge however is not only cost per kWhr, it is for reliable power. The lower cost of the solar is no help on a cold winter night, unless there is reliable backup, whether fossil fueled, nuclear or battery or some other technology. Those costs must be considered in any realistic evaluation. The attraction of the fossil and nuclear generators is that they work reliably 24/7. Getting the infrastructure and the people to accept something more erratic will not be easy or cheap. The recent UK blackout is an illustration of the problem. Note that in theory, a globally connected very high power grid might be the answer, but politics do not seem to favor this supranational option.

Dr Judith Curry is not a fan of this work, calling it 'the worst paper I have ever seen published in a reputable journal'. Her blog explains why she is irate. https://judithcurry.com/2019/08/14/the-latest-travesty-in-consensus-enforcement/

Silly story imho, especially as the US tried to buy it once before, after WW2. At that time, the offer price was $100 MM, but Denmark did not rise to the bait.

Good on you!

Cognitive dissonance. Germany has a strong political belief in climate science and heavily subsidized renewables. Meanwhile, their CO2 emissions are setting new records, at least based on the most recent reports I could find. https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2017/10/10/why-arent-renewables-decreasing-germanys-carbon-emissions/#137550ae68e1

Universes, please give us readers a bit of help. I have no idea how to read these maps or what they signify. Obviously they are clear to you, but others less skilled need help!

Investors surely are not stupid, so when the government offers large subsidies for hugely more costly but guaranteed profitable duplicate alternative energy sources on grounds that they are not emitting CO2, the money will flow. Sadly the wind does not blow regularly or evenly, nor does the sun shine constantly or reliably, so old style conventional backup power remains essential and maintenance costs remain high. In essence society spends resources duplicating its power sources, at the expense of more socially beneficial alternatives. I call that malinvestment and it is very large.

No argument there, the but not to object when the science is widely presented with nonsense exaggerations feeds the conspiracy theories and hurts the credibility of the underlying discipline. There are huge malinvestments being made in response to these exaggerations and they come at a considerable social cost. As guiding members of society, scientists do have a responsibility to help it avoid doing stupid stuff imho.

+10!! The voice of reason, based on the evidence we have. Would that the science organizations such as the AAAS were not so oblivious of the political uses to which the science is being put. Their silence in the face of the nonsense exaggerations feeds the conspiracy theories imho.

Thank you for this more detailed and thoughtful reply. I'd really appreciate links to the underlying papers. I have no issues with CO2 as a feedback component. My concern is that CO2 was at a nadir in the ice cores when temperatures began to climb, so a catalytic role seems pretty much excluded, as there is no reason for catalysis at 280 ppm when there was none at 330 ppm. Separately, H2O vapor has the virtue of acting as a much wider spectrum GHG, than CO2, so it is hard to dismiss it as unable to catalyze long term changes in temperature, but I've no insight into that.